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For Ngugi Wa Thiong’o (1938-2025)

Ngugi 1

In the eloquent water of the River Between
Minnows argue the terror of the shark
Rifted mountains hold hands
Across a vast and breathless silence

A soil unspeakably rich:
Red-rooted vegetables beckon from roadside stalls
A corn-covered distance connects my eye
To a yearning horizon

Bleating sheep romp in temperate coats
Unmindful of donkeys trotting under
Their missionary burdens, trailed by tough-limbed
Peasants sobered by the vagaries of the market

Voices and echoes
Across rifted silences
Echoes and voices
Of half-told stories and syncopated songs:

Of the grain of wheat
Which feeds succeeding seasons,
The long, sweat-soaked journey
From grass to bread…

In a house
Somewhere there in Kamiriithu
A story-teller was born
Whose tales traverse the world

 

*This tribute first appeared in “Flowers of the Rift Valley”, a section on Kenya in my book, If Only the Road Could Talk: Poetic Peregrinations in Africa, Asia, and Europe, published in 2017.