Salty liquid dripping faster than running yard to yard
they were all coming for you
your clammy tenacious grip on squawking stolen bird
as you brined in your own perspiration
Boy! That soup wouldn’t have tasted good anyways
but you aren’t there now
to taste mwiri pepper, broad leaf thyme and garlic …
what were you thinking to stoke primal fires so ?
they had the rage of adrenalin when they gave chase
a rush collectively higher than the kaieteur
as they tied you up like a rooster in Stabroek market
and then anointed you with sugar water
it would be a baptism by fire
you sensed it and you remembered God perhaps
or felt betrayed by Moses and his ten commandments
for he did not magnify killing to stealing
Or the pain clouded such frivolous thought
when you were to the taste of all those marabunta or acoushi
or other such legionary ants
that clambered all over your sweet and sweaty body
a strange sacrifice it was
man for bird …
or man for crime
or man for self righteous rage
I apologize for the horror of the pain
but I cannot make it mine
It is too much to endure even in poetry
or in remembering
even if the memory is borrowed
I only hope you didn’t have to beg for death long
rest in peace …
.
.
.
Because we do terrible things and some stories need to be told.