LIFE! She is...

I would dwell forever in that hour. Forever in that afternoon I spent with you. In your affable companionship, time ceased to move. My blood warmed in my veins and cooled in my arteries, scattering dash shivers of excitement through me. Your words tickled me; send me into bouts of delightful laughter. You tenderly reached out your cold hands and touched my gullible heart, caressing and kissing my soul with your experienced lips. I would break into a dance as you sang to me.

I know it didn’t turn out as you would have liked. That you had more in mind than I could would offer. My apologies.

Some memories I will continually cherish. They are pleasant.

Sometimes, I habitually pick what is appropriate to remember, when it is convenient. This time, I’ve decided to crop out a piece of that beautiful afternoon we spend together. Blot out the smutty details and cherish the finer bits. I will hold no bitterness.

If I may borrow your words, she is beautiful and you would like to admire and adore her. Hold her tenderly and caress her soft skin with the kisses of your luscious lips. Cherish her like a desert oasis, love her without holding back and relish in her presence like in a pool of sweet scented perfume. She is sweet like freshly blended pure mango juice, needs no spicing up.

Precisely my sentiments on life.

She is not a white sheet, maybe just a tint. Probably cream or a very light golden brown, I think. Like jagged diamond, she is imperfectly perfect. You could mould her to suit your taste, but risk cracking her. She is exquisite in her uncut wholeness and wild roughness. Either way, life is precious.

She is delicious. Sweeter than strawberry ice cream, like flavoured crisps dipped in molten chocolate. She leaves a tinge of fresh longing beneath the taste of satisfaction. Pure delight. At every angle you admire her; she is as bright as the sky shortly after the rains. She has a seductive glamour that alluringly fascinates and captivates you.  Thrillingly enchanting even the rockiest of souls into a dopy ecstasy. Her poisonous beauty stands out like the snow caped cliffs of the Everest. She has flaws that unsurprisingly serve to enhance her charm.

Life!

She has many haters. Some embrace and dine with her while flashing fake smiles. They dance with her in the open arena yet stab her in the back as soon as she turns her head. She is delicate yet resilient. Unbreakable in an elusive manner.

Others say she’s an arrogant nasty bitch who screws mercilessly. Arrogant? Well, there’s a thin line between confidence, ego and arrogance. Nasty? I’d say deliciously sour, like gourd milk or unsugared lemonade. A bitch? Yeah, she witchy with a capital ‘B’. Merciless? I wouldn’t know about that. She’s been kind. Often bore out her firm shoulder for many a disturbed head to lie.

Lovers… she’s had only a few, though minions have at her heart knocked. Trust she withholds. She is afraid, not of them, but of herself. ‘‘Trust no one, including yourself’’ she often counsels.

She is life, oh life!

... As the sky is blue

I am sure of my feelings for you.

As sure as the sky is blue.

Sometimes it is a deep blue, other times a light blue.

Still the sky is blue, as my affection for you is sure.

There are times the sky appears grey …

such times it tears apart and bleeds out,

drenching the earth in its tears.

I have also seen it appear a barren grey.

Lacking the pregnancy that births rain.

Still, the world over, everyone knows, the sky is blue.

In the night the sky becomes black.

Like the buttocks of an African pot.

Its beauty appears lost.

Many a night, like fireflies in an enchanted forest,

stars brighten up the black sky.

In its magical beauty, the night sky bewitches many a dreamer.

Rouses a tempestuous desire that drags my foot out to the dance field.

Yet always, the sky stays blue.

And my foot stays in your hut.

Secret Admirer

He watched her in awe.

Today she was dozing in class. He knew that if their strict lecturer saw her, he would kick Mueni out of class. Nevertheless, he enjoyed watching her angelic face as she slept. He wondered what it would be like to have her wake up next to him. Even though her thick neck was now failing to hold her neck upright, she looked peaceful. Jackson Bwindo imagined that she must have a very comfy bed. Probably made of pure mahogany and held together by silver screws. She was without doubt, from a very wealthy family. He wondered whether she would either laugh or snort when she found out that his own father made beds for a living. And that that was the family business passed down his generation from his grandfather. What would she think if she found out that, he was being groomed to be a carpenter too? That he had only come to the university because his former principal thought it was prestigious.

Bwindo pulled out his sketchbook where he had made several sketches of the kind of beds he would be making once he left Nairobi. He had been to many furniture stores and seen the kind of furniture rich people were accustomed to. Now he wanted to be not just the mere village carpenter his father and grandfather were, but to make such posh pieces. He wondered whether she would like them. He looked at her again and began to imagine that she must have slept on a thick mattress covered with very soft silk and/or cotton, the kind he only saw in advertisements and on display in supermarkets. But if she did (and he was sure she did) enjoy such luxurious comfort why she was so sleepy at barely eight o’clock in the morning? He wondered aloud whether she hadn’t slept at all the previous night. His friends, customarily seated beside him in the wide and dimly lit lecture hall, heard him and jeeringly began to offer suggestions. Maybe she had been out partying all night like the spoilt rich kind she most obviously was. Or maybe she had been busy pleasing some rich and arrogant boyfriend. Alternatively, could she have been up all night gossiping and making fun of her classmates and lecturers.

Bwindo wanted to think that she’d been studying till late. But exams were still a whole two months away. He decided that she must have been watching movies all night, as he often did. That gave him satisfaction, but only momentarily, for in no time his mind was up again asking what kind of movies she watched. What did she like? Maybe he should ask her. He began to play their conversation in his mind.

The snotty professor must have made a joke. It might have been funny because many people laughed. Sometimes you couldn’t tell whether people were laughing at a funny joke or at the person who cracked an unfunny joke. Mueni hadn’t heard it, but neither had he. Bwindo was excessively busy fantasizing. Now he returned to stare at her and was amazed at how pretty she was when she blushed. She had been startled awake by the loud somehow rude laughter and her cheeks almost turned red in embarrassment.They would have if her skin were any lighter.

Bwindo found her very aesthetically pleasing.

In fact, he only attended every lecture (and punctually so) just so he would watch her walk in. Her skin complexion was a deep brown that both amazed and baffled him. It was even and flawless on her face and neck as well as on her hands and legs. She was not black like him. She was overly confident in her radiant deep brown African skin. Bwindo had always been disgusted at the girls from his village who bleached their faces to appear lighter and fairer. He always laughed at how they forgot to bleach the rest of their bodies. Mueni was not as light skinned as the rest of her friends who usually wore very tiny clothes to display it. Her dressing was always very descent and classy. Bwindo was proud of her. He adored her, even though he knew clearly that the chances of her ever being his were as huge as a mustard seed. He did not mind. After all a mustard seed is not that tiny. If faith that size is sufficient to move a mountain, then he had hope, immense hope.

He smiled in his heart and decided to concentrate for the remaining part of that lecture. He couldn’t. So he got up, tucking his note book into his back pocket and his pen in his hair behind his ear and headed out of the lecture hall. The lecturer professor sarcastically asked whether he had learned enough already. He ignored him and walked on.
Once outside he debated whether to go to sleep in his hostel room or to eat a pre-lunch at the cafeteria. He wasn’t sleepy and he was impecunious. He usually watched movies but he had pawned off his DVD player over the weekend. He knew the computer lab would be filled up by now. There was little Jackson Bwindo could do to entertain himself .So he reluctantly walked towards the library, deciding he would read newspapers for a while.

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