7 June 2007 The Dry Season, Commune de Lukonga

Some ‘saison sèche!’
Here midsummer is Midwinter. Is this Africa ?
In the market place soft wet soil collapses underfoot, dark and moist.

I pull back the fumes of the scene into my lungs
And spit on the rich black soil that glows black in the
Luminescence of a subtropical morning.

There is no sunlight-
Only grey ultra violet intensity in the market
The place where I spat on the ground
My spit has already absorbed on the floor of the market
Of small things, of poor people
Matches, batteries, cigarettes by the stick, nail polish pink

-the Hat’s not for sale, with all the pride of Papa Mobutu himself
An old man at his little stall informs me
Shame, it’s a very fine hat!

School children, street children, old children, inner children
Old shopkeeper in a fine hat in Lukonga Market
Beautiful young mothers, infants marsupially attached
On their backs with bright ‘pagnes’
Groceries stacked high on their heads.
Do you know your own beauty?

Lukonga Market
10 minutes. 3 conversations
A boy whose name is unpronounceable. Bilingual confusion; but satisfaction
Second a man with holes in his teeth. Whose twin daughters will celebrate
First communion in one day’s time.
Finally on this midwinter midsummer morning the Dr. stands before me,
His one good eye scrutinizing through opaque wrap around distance.

I can remember the massacre.
They looted the campus
The windows were all smashed
Blood on the walls
Feaces on the floor
Screaming
Raping

And the morning passes to noon