Here, now, is the world before me:
Women are struggling to make a living
And men struggling for beer.
The markets are full of drying-up warehouses
And market stalls pregnant with emptiness.

A woman comes in,
Calls the last goods on the shelf, indicating interest.
There are the dying smiles that echo no goodwill
Upon the naming of a price-below-purchasing;
There are the hungry laughters at the teeth of the buyer
Who seeks his own gains;
There are the welling-up tears that fill the eyes of the seller
Who needs the penny to live another day.

Poverty and want wears an ugly face
And gives hate a voice to echo its disdain.
Much displeasure fills the air but in business
The customer always wins.

Pain eats up my heart as I watch the transaction.
Here, survival matters- just as much as love,
But now even this is no more.
                                                      
                                                                                     Abacheke-Egbema, Imo State. January 2014

Will you remember me, Tanzania?
When my map of your curves is folded
And I see no more your mountain in my mind
Only your smile, straight as a line
On the day I flew away.

The wind travels far, Tanzania
And I must follow
Knowing you has left me hollow
And thus I search
But will you remember me?

The feel of my flip-flop footfalls on your face,
The sound of my laugh as your wind carried it away,
Will you remember how your thorns pierced me,
Pleading with me to stay?
Oh, will you remember me Tanzania?

We pause for a moment at the barbed wire fence,
Brief it burned
But coke-bottle circles in my cheeks will be my memento
Like your dark-eyed children and how, somehow they grow
Taller, darker, row on row.
Tell me you will miss me so
Oh Tanzania.

Will you remember how your sun kissed my forehead?
And how I tasted the feel of your words on my tongue?
How I stole your air to fill my lungs?
I stole as much as I could bear.
Small, dark hands braided my hair

Will you remember me, Tanzania?
As I cling to these landmarks and scars
Which fade from my mind,
Remember how I shook as we left each other behind
Remember how I wore your earth on my skin
Then let your rains wash me clean
How I felt your forest
Brown and green
You were not as you first seemed
But nor was I

Tanzania, Tanzania
What will you remember?
Here with your thoughts on mine,
I bless the legacy of your skyline.
Beautiful or ******
Oh, Tanzania
Who do you say that I am?

I
Years and years of yearning
Dreams and dreams depressing
I fly back, back on the wings of memory
And time my pilot be
For  time's grey hands yet swings
Ticking away behind sturdy wings
Backwards i journey humming like the bird
Past-ward to scenes
And sounds once seen
Once heard

Tearful laughter, painful joys
Youthful blunders - silent noise

Over and over, the flames rise
Over and over, storms in our eyes
Blue nights that once upon were
Who was there, what was fair

I write of a past once veiled
Lonesome,
        dark memories i reveal
I will speak of choking,
        muffled yells
Pain. Depression. Fear - Hell

II
"Ah, say berries taste sweeter red
Their juices free as more they bled"

But who taught the kid to feed?
Nanny dumb; he nipped the ****
More so, as like a log she lay
Dogs shall school your kid to play

Yet should we upon mores lay blame
Cholerous slight culture's game
Slay her players with a Poisoned Placard
Aces. Queens. Kings. Protesters. Playing card

No, i shall not cheer my own fall - come
Sit with me, give me your hand, come -
Though you are broken, hold -
Proud. Resilient. Bold.
I call to you, "come father,
Tell me what house fire make the kites gather,
What color, the smoke of marijuana?
Your girlfriend - is she really from Ghana?
Will you have stone if i gave you meat,
Tell me, what is it you do in corners of dark streets!?"

When the sun first shows its beaming face,
at the break of a blissful new dawn.
Your birds that exult with elegant grace,
bid farewell to the night that's gone.

Your flowers ornate your vast lands,
of your priceless treasures they boast.
The besotting Kilimanjaro that stands,
dominating your east coast.

You are home to the best precious stones,
the land of gleaming clear waters.
Garnished with skills and strong bones,
you are served by your dutiful daughters.

The soil that expands on your gracious vest,
the equator that cuts your enormous chest,
birds that bear your golden crest,
are a few ideals of your daring zest.

The treasured soil that fills your vast expanse,
the gracious finesse in your every dance.
From Egypt, to South Africa, Nigeria to Kenya,
From the stupefying Sahara to the beatific Victoria.

I love you dear Africa, The land of the wild,
This poem is for you from your little child.

Black oil,
Tarnished the white sands of a paradise that is,
No longer a paradise,
Because no matter how much you try to clean it up,
It will always be a shade darker than it used to be.
Not fully regaining its color.
The thick molasses no longer holds it together,
Africa, seems broken beyond repair.

Diamonds don't shine as bright as Rihanna suggested.
Instead they glow red,
With the blood stains of the innocents,
Slaughtered for wedding rings.

Bullets...
Cutting into the flesh of my ancestors,
Like those very diamond cutting into glass,
Because what is life compared to,
A piece of rock?

There is a pseudo-melodramatic darkness that,
Echoes off of every piece of light they reflect.
Sitting only on the fingers and necks
Of the people who can afford them,
As fingers and necks were chopped and severed for them.
I am unable to identify with the cries that still manage to,
Resonate within the wind,
Apparently...
I am the only one that can hear it.

The tape, as I unstick it from its place, rips off plates of paint from our crummy, moldy walls.

My heart wrinkles a little.

I fold the tape over the corners of my collage. Lay it down over my everest-sized pile of clothes-to-trade-for-souvenirs.

I sigh.

It is quiet.

A cockroach scurries out of a shirt sleeve. I flick him lovingly off the bed. The only one to keep my house company these days.

I start pulling out notebooks, so much. So many. Too many things I collect and funnel value into.

I must decide which to take and what to leave behind in the ******* bin.

Back at school, I chuck half the pile, almost violently, into the trash and stride away. Stay there then. Have it your way.

Only a few minutes before all of this, I bragged about being ready to go home, washing my hands of this ridiculous place.

But it only just occurred to me then that by leaving Africa, I will be facing a whole new life. Like a neo-Alice, falling further down the rabbit hole. I am being sieved, strained, pressed until the juices of energetic volunteerism is squeezed dry.

I have only heard rumors, of course, but I believe that what I will be facing will be maybe even more terrifying than it is here.

my eyes are filled with wonders,
my heart is filled with spirit
like coffee for the soul
gelato for the brain,
travel makes me sing,
zambia, mallorca and spain.

mother and my friend,
embracing, reuniting
tightening the over stretched
ropes that bind
a mother and
her daughter

under a tourist's sun,
upon white sand beaches
luxury at my beck and call,

i will recover from this
third-world hell-hole

to be conflicted, engages,
happy and bitter-sweetend,

all of this and more, i
am acutely eager to live through.

come on, june 1. you can run to me faster than this.