We all know shame and understand to avoid it when necessary. But sometimes, we just walk down her street and hope the world would forget.
Do they forget? Or do you forget? The unexplainable embarrassment of the year.

Yeah! My case was a shame of the year and this is how it happened.

My grandma, "a hajat" runs a retail shop along a highway in some small town. It faces a rising sun which I enjoy bathing on the cold days.
I greet her, grab a chair, place it onto the verandah as soon as she opens her doors to the shop.

She is a tough person to read really. Unlike most elderly ladies who give a cozy feeling while talking to them, she freaks me out. Like she doesn't like me. Or for some reason, hates me and just blurs me in her mind's eye. And I think I did give her a reason to.


About eight months ago, I came to live next to her, at my own place in my own first home. A single room, rented, along a muddy road (cause it's raining now) off the highway. The building is one block away from where the shop is. So if the shop faces north, my room would face the east.


I should say I didn't know her until that time. Like we had not seen each other until then, and until she sold me a three litre Jerry can for I think triple the price, Ugshs 3500. And then, she gave me a reason to go to other shops. It was expensive even in my own ignorance since I had never done shopping for household items before.
So I tried other shops and bought a five litre jerry can at Ugshs2500. I was happy. It felt like money well spent. That I was a genius finally in control of my first days in the real world, away from home and school.
But at the same time, a wrong or the best idea of never to buy from her again. I mean, if family is to be exploited by you, am sorry grandma, I ain't going to be part of your legacy.


So the sneaky dealings started like I was buying drugs from another dealer and had to be sure she never comes to know. Not that she would do anything, but really it would look weird.

My new dealer would be a shop along the same highway, on the same side, just a one block away from the grandma's left.  A she of course, who undeniably is beautiful. A gracious voice and radiant smile, offering to do way good stuff if I buy from her. Like she sorts my rice so I take ready to cook and eat. Which of course my grandma, wouldn't do. And again, she is beautiful.


Anyway I usually peeked at the verandah to see if grandma wasn't there, then walk like a boss to my dealer whom am so proud to buy from. And this was just smooth until, I can't even say...


It was a normal black out, just a few candle lights from the still open shops, and flashing lights of passing vehicles. The sky was dark enough for the  many visible stars that dotted it's canvas. And this guy, myself, chooses to take a walk, masking the night, thinking about my own duties till I come close to my dealer's shop, "mama Mariam" that I remembered I had a pickup to do.

It was dark and if that wouldn't have been the best time, then there wouldn't have been any better. She was not on her verandah, but dumping ******* into a "pit." so I took hold of the moment and made the pickup. I didn't ask for a wrapping for my 1kg of rice and turned to leave the shop.

And duh, lights everywhere. To be specific, light above my head. Electricity was back from its normal routines as it always is in developing countries. Very bright. Probably a new bulb. Looking across me, grandma standing on the verandah looking back at me. With my spoils in my hands, I swear I wished to be anywhere else but not there. I was drowning literally in my mind that I froze for sometime. May be a minute or two. Until I went back into the shop and asked for a wrapping before walking shamefully with my head low.

It was the worst I had ever felt in a long time. Wait, the worst that I still do feel. So guilty that I have been avoiding my morning sun bath.

And when I did see her, she replied to me like nothing had happened. Huh? Nothing?!
Just with her stale face like before which could mean she always knew I bought from that shop. Or worst, "I don't care. You can go to hell grandson. You are a sellout."

And to the moment I write this, I still feel her stale eyes, hear her raspy voice like echoes from a nightmare that am never to wake up from, taunting me like a ghost.

Grandma, am sorry. But she is a pretty  lady the stole me from you. Please just understand why I had to do this. It was a tough decision that took seconds to make and would probably do the same until you start selling a bit cheaply. Wait, even if you did, she is a pretty woman and that's a good reason to keep buying from


And again, am sorry! Love you!

I feel the cold of the morning
And I know of your heart's longing

You wanna roll with me?
For that's fine by me

How about we do this all day
Forgetting woes of your yesterday

Drying wounds and tears
Far away from your fears

Making love under the rain,
To ease your soul's pain

For sometimes life is happiness,
Even within one's weakness

That in the arms of a darling
forever is never changing

Mother had a ship,
With a white canvas falling,
Stretched by the winds of life

We enjoyed her deck,
Watching the apparent horizon,
With it's colours of the sunset,

Darkness faded in dearly,
With the gentle waves rocking us,
Listening to her lullabies of the sea

Of gods and monsters
Kings and queens
Under the lamp of the moon

Some nights were cold,
But her woven cloaks,
Always wrapped our little souls

And when we were hungry,
It was the grains,
Rice from a lost island,

The southern sea,
Merry faces,
Drunk on fish soup

What would a boy need?
Else jumping over the board,
To bath in the salty waters

Of course she wouldn't,
Keeping her dear ones so close,
In her arms of love

Until, one night,
Violent skies
Raging clouds

Howling thunder
Within flashes of lightening
And soaring waves

Slapping the ship's floors,
Breaking her mast,
Within squeaking wood

To finally split,
Choking on gushing waters,
Within our muted screams

Below, it was gloomy
The walls of death,
Closing in fast

Not a good bye,
A last kiss
Or hug

But a freeing soul,
Rising to the heavens,
Before a yank

Up,
Gasping for air,
my head peering,

Above the water,
Briefly,
And diving again,

To feel my lungs shrink,
As I sunk deeper,
To the gates of hell

But, a plank
That my hand took hold of
Pulling it to my chest,

In one tight embrace
Dancing to a turbulent rhythm
The hymn of the brave

To finally watch the sunrise
From below,
Up the endless fabric of a blue sky

Swimming, lone,
Following a lost map
In the vast sea of the living

I saw the waves,.
Rising,
Roaring
Foaming
The clouds dark,
Throwing bolts of lightening
painting the night
It was a tiny boat,
Sunken oars,
smiling at life,
For the wonderful timing
Shutting my eyes slowly,
To awake into,
A tranquility of blue waters

The night dawns with it's coldness
And am afraid of the dark,
Will you come lay with me?
Next to me
On this,
The 14th,
Of the second month
I call you mine
Happy Valentine's

It would be the 11th
Six seconds off a midnight,
Within sounds of a ticking clock,
And howls of hungry dogs

Your breath,
like the wind,
Warming my chest
At the tempo of your heart

How delicate and calm,
The lines on your face,
That smile when you sleep,
A sunrise in the night

That I would wish,
To watch,
Till the first rays of the morrow,
Colour your tender skin

I stand tall in day,
But crash within your arms
This thumping heart,
The evidence of my flaw

A beautiful flaw,
To know love,
To understand her ways,
And finally feel whole.

Thank you love,
Good morning

The tears from my heart,
Fill the pages of this plea

Words of a broken man,
Who awakes to a lost love

Standing on cliff,
And calling to death

If this life feels like death itself,
Why live if I can't be yours?

Knowing you love someone else,
But failing to understand this aching

if I ain't yours,
Then why long for your breath?

A heart thing
Speaking a language I don't understand

A senseless falling,
Into the arms of one to stab me

Why feel so right?
But so wrong