The headline said 68 people murdered in Nairobi,
and I thought, no, they got it wrong, it’s not murder, this is war.
Bullets can buy anything in shopping malls.
Digital Cameras.
Coffee.
Revenge.
Kenya is a dropped shield
in the blood of Somalia.
The knees
of the Indian Ocean.
The red in that African
vein -
a
long
distance
bleeding.
When sixty-eight people die
because a shopping mall
is built in the middle of a war
crossfire
becomes
another word for innocence -
another way to say
He
was just out
with
his nephew having coffee
when
he got his temple shot.
People that might’ve been poets
like Muhammad al-Ajami,
Lorca or Kofi Woonor -
taken to darkness
with bullets and jail cells.
who believes in a God
that makes sense of a woman
chattered with an AK-47
across her child bearing womb?
Why is this happening in a country
where let
us all pull together
is an anthem?
