Monday, November 17, 2008

For 6 year old Cizanye of Burundi

What is death?

It is the endless waters

the great lakes
sweeping in all directions

The long grass
warm against my legs

The red dust beneath
my feet

The hushed clatter
of a knife
bumping against a rifle butt

The sound of men


What color is death?


White

As the bone
of a cow rib
poking from the ground

As the luminous glow

of my mothers pagnes

As the bed of rice
beneath the kidney beans


As my skin
which brings

men in the night

8 comments:

Allan Rae said...

Thanks you Chris for rememebring Cizanye

this little girl , taken in the night by evil men.

She deserved a far better end.

Death to FEAR and long live LOVE !!

She is singing with the angels and has long forgotten this great tragedy against her.

For GOD is good and his mercy endures forever !!

Thanks again Chris ........

Chris Never said...

Thank you Allan,

Such a terrible fate for one so small, I do hope, as you say, she is singing with the Angels.

burning moon said...

I don't know who Cizanye is, but the poem is wonderful

Chris Never said...

Hey Kid, sorry, been away for a few days.

I enclose, a news clipping about her.

BUJUMBURA - Criminals with suspected links to witch doctors murdered a six-year-old albino girl Monday overnight in Burundi and made away with her severed limbs, officials told AFP.

"A group of bandits armed with rifles attacked the home of a six-year-old albino called Cizanye in Bugongo," 220 kilometres east of the capital Bujumbura, said local official Remi Sengiyumva.

"These criminals decapitated her and then chopped off her arms and legs, which they took with them," he said.

Chris Never said...

It doesn't pay to be an albino in Africa, there is a trade amongst witch doctors in Albino's body parts, X number have been killed in recent years for this superstitious bullshit.

The new millennium

the old ways

*shakes head*

burning moon said...

I love this poem. It's truly a wonderful piece of writing. Wonderful.

Chris Never said...

Well thank you Moon,
not often I get more than one 'Wonderful' out of you *cheeky smile*

To me the piece seems.....spartan I guess, but then sometimes, thats how I do it.

burning moon said...

it makes my brain try to take off in all sorts of directions at once, which I think is the feeling people call 'wonder'. When you get transfixed by having too many potential directions to take all at the same time.