A Chicken's Funeral

When master's men are
sooner promoted to glory
By gout, mysterious diets or mangled automobiles;
Every deaf corner of Earth
Is fed with the diet of bad news--
The radio screams to rupture our eardrums
The Tv and papers flaunt their chubby faces:
Mourbrating lives not fully lived!

But
When we lose grip
on our dearest foul breath
Nobody cares, who'll trouble himself to know
Where, why and how life neglected us?
We are but mere chicken
Accursed to scratch in dirt, forever scratch--
Never to soar to skies.

To stand for us
A sound relative of means we lack thus...

The radio seals its restless mouth, forever;
The Tv blacks out
As papers devote to selling love
to those with hearts to buy.
They have no room in the obituaries
For a chicken's head, really
Who knows a chicken in time of satiation?

So the songs of our departure
are sung by wind to lands yonder
To fellow bare-footed dust eaters;
They hurry to see us off
With nothing but bitter tears in swollen eyes
That have never seen the moon.

Outside our crumbled nests stands them, master and his men
Savouring the bread of sorrow unequally
They can't offer refuge from hot sun and rain
Oh, we could have erected bungalows, but we coundn't!

So they announce their presence,
Silence late wailers, begging for ears
To savour their song of political thirst!
Upon swearing to share our sorrow
They jump into jeeps, to dodge rain
Completely forgetting about us
Seekers of the kingdom promised.
(c) wafula p'khisa
Thigh of an Elephant

The Mango Tree.

This ageless mango tree
Tall standing at the heart of the village
This ageless mango tree
Attracting climbers regardless of age
Drains my bones of sap
Oh, weak I am! I can't speak...

How would I reach its fruits firm
Whose astounding succulence reigns village gossip?
Those who up hauled themselves to pluck them
are confined to wheelchairs and crutches
Those who endeared their selves to its warm fragrance
are giving psychiatrists sleepless nights!

It's under the cool shed of this tree
All village virmin cut thirst
Brewed by boring bedminton;
or nagging and absent wives.
A whole month's sweat is deposited
In the small depthless hole of the tree
As many stop
To partake of the fruit of Eden
Before sunset...

Soon there will no man left
Herein to serve fertile women

Who will cut this tree?
Wanjala claims to be one
Because he starves manuring her;
Wafula claims to be one
Because he drains himself watering her;
But Manila claims to own her--
He sleeps not, putting eyes on her
So out the bulls face each other
Leaving her tall standing thus, like before.
(c) wafula p'khisa