Neighbours are Bad Friends

So, what is it with perimeter-walled fences

That barricades good neighbours?

On metal gates, there are warning signs

Of mbwa kali (fierce dogs) and 24-hour surveillance

What happened? What changed?

I thought if I came over and said my greetings

Like good neighbours do, the least I could expect

Was a thermos flask full of tea and perhaps

Little of suspicious looks

But not so

Instead, neighbours know each other

If their flowerpots are knocked over by neighbour’s children

Eye-brows knit, gates are opened for process servers

Suddenly, they know each other

If the other pumps over his home theatre’s volume

Of course to out-compete the other’s house all-night prayers

I stand in-between these Berlin-walled residences

I wonder to myself, wasn’t it a thief’s theory

That the higher the wall, the mighty the residence

Which equals more likelihood for attack?

In the past, it was my business

To know how many children my neighbor has

If his child sat while I passed, I taught it manners

If I try it today, they call it ‘assault’

If I find out why they are not awake on a Saturday morning

They call it ‘intrusion to privacy’

Is this the new form of neighbourliness?

Photo credit: Link

Shared with: Theme Thursday # Neighbours

Of Clouds: The False Rain Maker

Image supplied by Theme Thursday

My Son, Son of the Bull,

Clouds are our ancestors too

They tell us so many things

In wisdom, in careful measured words

If you see the clouds

Azure, as innocent as a calf

In a pen, don’t be deceived

In my time I have seen them quickly gather

And pour like shards of glass on my bald

And when I am drenched scatter

Away and let sun shine

Letting people wonder who,

In his madness, poured me bucketfuls of water

Then there are those dark clouds

Hanging atop Kacheliba Hill

Dark, furious, deathly

As if they will flood the hill itself

To add effect, the clouds rumble

And throw in a few flashes here

It sends everyone in panic

Soon, drying maize in the homestead

Is rushed to the hut

Wet clothes hurriedly picked from thorn trees

Children pinched to stay in the hut

And then, in wicked sense of humour,

The clouds clear away

Laughing all the way

But perhaps in guilt

They let a few drizzles here

Hardly to clear the dust

So son, Son of the Bull,

Of the knowledge of the clouds I cannot

Pretend to have

I once heard a Rain Maker in the village beyond

Who, with the experience, mistook cirrus clouds

For cumulo-nimbus clouds

Then who am I, a mere pair of half-shut eyes

To interpret the divine nature of the clouds?

C) Lorot Salem 2011

From a prompt Theme Thursday # Clouds