Strange Bedfellows

Separated by high, razor-crowned fences

With shards of broken glass

As an extra deterrent

And electrified wires

And metal grilles, and German shepherds

And Maasais, ‘Warias’, or G4S

Our world and theirs stand,

Like parallel universes.

 

Ours is suburbia -

Paved pathways in estates

And two cars in every garage

Uptown apartments and swanky bungalows

Tastefully furnished with couture leather,

Persian rugs and state-of-the-art gadgets.

 

I wander through the well-kept playground

With nets in the goalposts and everything

It’s four o’clock and the ground’s empty

But even from here I can almost hear

The cheers and the groans

As chances are created and missed

And the furious button bashing

Tells me that football never went out of fashion -

They just made a new version.

 

Step outside the gate

And into the Other Side

With the makeshift ‘mabati’ shacks

And the narrow, dusty pathways "

With the ‘houses’ crowding in on either side

Jostling for space -

 

See, on our of the wall

You hardly ever see your neighbours

They’re a comfortable hedge away

But here, you smell their lunch

And hear every restless insomniac turn

You’re woken by their babies

And, by mutual agreement,

Only one radio set

Is ever on at a time…

Besides, it saves batteries.

 

The children kick their polythene balls

Along the narrow, dusty pathways

Skinny, scrawny, barefoot boys

Running after each other

Or away from their mothers

Dragging behind them little boxes on wheels

Made of bottle tops with punctures in them

Or rolling along - making engine noises -

Discarded tires with punctures in them -

 

The old men sit around

Intensely concentrated on their game of draughts

Or the young men sitting around

With loud voices and lewd jokes

Around rusty metal cups

High on methanol -

Like, “Ata mkizima stima, bado tutakunywa!”

 

Faces hardened by hardship

Eyes dimmed by despair

Young women carry around their babies

Looking for work so they can feed them

As their countrymen across the Wall

Have enough and more than enough

And dream ever of having more.

 

“Indeed,” says Dedan

Back from the shadow,

His eyes no longer deadened

“Such strange bedfellows!

Squalor and Splendour

Sharing the same pillow.”

And he wonders how his struggle -

The seeds that he planted

Watered with blood, the future that he fought for

Come to such a strange fruition…

 

The Haves have it all

And want more.

The Have-nots have nothing

And ask only for a chance

A people divided by invisible walls

As insurmountable

As an Iron Curtain.

 

Two people in a bed

On a cold, cold night

One - slowly but surely -

Inch by inch, takes all the blanket;

Which is large enough for both;

And all the pillow;

Which is wide enough for both "

Leaving the other destitute,

Trembling in the cold.

How long before

The disgruntled, shivering sufferer

In the dead of the blackest night

Smothers his ungrateful partner

And takes everything for his own?

 

Reviews

[quinfinn]

interesting title

[TLK]

An angry eye is dragged around at the end of its disbelieving stalks. It takes everything in, unblinking.

You set up the falseness of suburbia very early and very completely: the shared enjoyment of a sport that is not even real. You call them out for this without being direct -- this shows the biggest strength of this poem, which is that you allude to the problems without stating them baldly. This is more than reportage, it is an artful assemblage of opinions based so closely on fact that the reader can float through like a magical observer.

I almost feel like Scrooge, being brought by one of the ghosts to view Christmas from a different angle. You accomplish a very wide perspective without many words.

When you do grasp for poetic imagery to intensify the image, it is as simple as a sharpened dagger going for the gut. How long will complacency go unsmothered? I am eager to know as well, and perhaps I would gladly offer the pillow.

[Alvin L. Kathembe]

Glad you understood this - this is a very Kenyan piece; lots of references (and swahili) which I'm sure were difficult...glad the message still got through though. Thanks for reviewing!