I won’t always come carrying good poems with me.
by Naomi Waweru
Nairobi, Kenya
I won't always come carrying good poems
with me.
Some days I'll come badly beaten, breathing
in shifts, mumbling in a dialect that has gone
to war and made little peace with
its losses.
Sometimes it will be with a fresh wound,
other times I'll be in stitches.
I'll come carrying the ghost of my father on my bare hands.
I'll convince you that he is actually here, watching, walking, breathing in and out like me.
Other times, all I'll have to show of him is my native name,
that has tied me to his mother.
Some days I'll carry his grave to your doorstep, wearing a grief from a bereaved mother,
a near dirge forming on my lips.
Other days, I'll watch it from my window.
Sometimes I'll linger on your doorstep,
other days I'll want to come charging in.
Other days,
I'll be a recovering bird on a branch,
pregnant with season, shuffling its feathers in a dance,
and these are the days you will demand an average poem from me.
I promise it will be good.
Child. Your Grief!
by Naomi Waweru
Nairobi, Kenya
Who taught those tiny bones to
carry the hurt of all those days?
Grief was not entirely made
to occupy your tiny hands,
but you let it out as leisurely
as you surely can,
and let it in as intense
as it comes.
Child,
there has never been a sure way to
let grief go!
Naomi Waweru
Naomi Waweru is inspired by love, vulnerability, the yearning of bodies to be free in their connection and has an eye for tradition and culture. Her writings present an adoration for the body. She presents it as your first sanctuary. She has works on and forthcoming on Ghost Heart Literary Journal, Kalahari Review, The African Writers Review, Neurological Literary Magazine, Poems for the start of the world anthology, AmpleRemains, Overheard Magazine and elsewhere. Find her on twitter @ndutapoems and Instagram @_ndutapoems.
Header Image by Ray Hennessy