Freeing spirits of the dead, the living, and also unborn

This poem, Freeing the Spirits, was first broadcast on America’s National Public Radio (NPR) in January 2009 to mark our Cousin Barry’s inauguration as President of the United States.

It’s reproduced here with the permission of yours truly, who asserts the moral right as its author: If I knew I would live

to tell this story

I would have brought you

platefuls of kuon and ngege –

fresh as the waters of Nam Lolwe.

And counsel the wisdom of

washing your hands with spittle

while living by the lakeside.

 

I hear the lake now bears the

name of a foreign queen

and you are the king

of a faraway land

eating with forks and knives

but won’t touch kuon and ngege

because somebody warns against

tropical diseases.

 

If I knew I would live to tell this story

I would have smeared

your face with shea butter

and hang cowrie shells on your long neck

to keep off evil spirits.

 

I know you are a free spirit

ruling the Free World

freeing the spirits of your

ancestors in Nam Lolwe

and all the oceans that they crossed shackled. So I shall eat kuon and gueno to celebrate.

But I am sad to eat without you.