My Son and I

When I look at my son

Fingers flicking on the play station

I marvel

Some few years ago in 1967

When I was his age

There were no such gadgets

Instead, we played sheki and birkoli

And shot each other using jumla plant guns

Girls played kora, boys played lifundo

I liked pepeta, I dribbed the ball like Christian Ronaldo

We made clay toys at Kacheliba Mixed

We went to mtelezo at Shabaha

Hunted for hyraxes and hares

But my son,

My son shoots with his toys

I don’t get it—he shoots people!

Or drives fast cars by pressing buttons

We are world apart,

I, the old fogey who played in the dust,

And my son, who sits up all day playing video games

I once sneaked into my son’s room and tried them

I think when I saw a figure aim a gun at me, I ducked

That was the last I had with those weapons!

Photo credit: Google.

A Day in the Life of a Nomad

4.00 a.m

Cow-bells outside

An occasional howl

Everything is peaceful

The village is calm and sleepy

5 a.m

Mothers milking cows at cow-sheds

The low of cows

Life is catching up

The village is waking up

7 a.m

Basking in the sun, taking tea

Counting cows and seeing them off

These cows needs to be rid of ticks

Time they were taken for cattle dip

9 a.m

Busy brushing teeth with kamsityan

Singing songs of my bull

The cows are grazing

It is me, my cows and my world

I am all peaceful

10 a.m

Gathered at baraza

Chief has a message

From serikali

Half asleep, resting my head on ng’achar

Looks like I will spend the whole day here

“Supay Kokwo,” Kirwokin greets

“Mmmmh,” we respond

“Bad news people, you stole from Turkana

It is in K.B.C and everywhere

I am in hot soup”

Age-old animosity

Tired culture

Spoilt image

Time folks went to school

Stopped this polygamy circus

Changed from nomadism to “somadism”

It is crazy!

1 p.m

Still half-awake, half-asleep under oron tree

Fellow old man is telling me how he first tasted rice

At the D.C’s compound

Then we hear a case of stolen donkey

Most complicated case

We listen on and on and on

5 a.m

I sprint from the baraza

Cut through thorn trees and shrubs

To go look for my cows

I pass through the market-place to buy tobacco

To keep the nostrils of an old man busy

Then I drive my cows home

Whistling and singing my bull songs

7 p.m

Seated at the aperit

With fellow old men

Fire lit to scare away witches

And to keep the stomach of old men

Warm and cared-for

We keep our guns at the ready

And sleep in the cold

Lorot Son of the Hills’ Notes

Kamsityan- A traditional toothbrush from a tree branch mostly from select trees.

Baraza- a Public gathering where information to the community is disseminated; a Kiswahili word.

Serikali- Kiswahili word for government.

Ng’achar-A Pokot traditional stool.

Supay kokwo- A form of Pokot greeting especially when addressing a large gathering of people.

Kirwokin- Pokot name for a chief.

Oron- a Tarmarind tree, most Pokot gatherings in Kacheliba are done under this tree.

Aperit- A resting place for Pokot men outside in the compound where fire is lit and from which they keep watch of their cows.

Serious Grass Business

(Prompt: Poets United Thursday Think Tank #59 Grass )

Let me wear camel-skin pair of shoes

Walk the walk of a herdsman

With far-flung clouds teasing above him

And the mist of hope lost

In a sweltering heat

What will I feel?

If I had an AK-47 on my back

A dozen arrows and the right instinct

Pray, from what will they protect me from

Unless I shot at the heaven’s tap?

He will walk on and on, that herdsman

To the point of listening to his footsteps

And after many days

Behold, he will lead his cows

To a no-man’s-land

Where one minute egrets

Abound and the next vultures prey

Life and death

For many months

This will go on

This little hobby of looking for grass.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Encounter with an Old Man

Today I gave an old man tobacco

Wrapped in polythene, given with a smile

He raised his head and looked at my eyes

Fair and square, as if by looking at them

He could look through my heart

I looked on, unsure about the wisdom of my act

When he smiled to expose his toothless gums

His palms outstretched as if on prayer

He stamped his feet around, waving the tobacco

The object of his delight, I never saw an old man happy

He spat on my palms and his, then rubbed them in my armpits

And my forehead and toes, saying:

“ My Child, let Tororot, the God of the Rising Sun

Brighten your path, whatever your heart conceives

Let it come to fruition, may your enemies scatter

And be trapped in panyirit, may your children

Be the sons and daughters of this land,

When am long gone to join my ancestors

May the fireplace of your hut never be dark

May your bulls grow big horns

May milk never lack in your gourds

May other elders listen to you in kokwo”

C) Lorot Salem 2011