Grief

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It feels like falling through rain,

the pelts of raindrops thudding against your skin,

your uplifted face welcoming tiny splices of pain,

the water trickling down your sweet onyx face

onto your expanse of dark chocolate neck,

the sweetness of the curve-length

diluted into strands of remorseful hurt,

hurtling further down onto your bronzed shoulders,

your collarbone shrieking in disbelief

at the ice drops nestling hard in its narrow cocoon.

Your chest heaves silently then loudly

thuds through the droplets,

it feels like falling through rain,

your cries swallowed up by the ice-grey precipitation

and your thumping heart pushing against the nestling ice drops

that press back against it, turning thumps into popsicles of pain,

your arms are noodles, the color of bwe bhulo,

with the strength of a newborn child,

your cries for salvation and deliverance

swallowed whole by the leviathan of love,

the noodle-arms flap in time to the beat of the rain

tap tapping against the expanse of your stygian back.

Once sinewy and strong, your back is now twisted,

pushed further into a soft curve of even softer curves

that splinter with the thumps and tap tapping of

what feels like rain

through which you are falling.

You can’t feel your legs,

the rage of rain wraps itself around the once-golden limbs,

choking the yellowness out of your life,

the raindrops dimming the rainbows from your thighs

right down to your toes,

It feels like falling through rain,

the pain hits each part of you

and as you fall faster and faster through this nameless fissure,

narrow, unforgiving, untelling,

the pain swallows you whole,

burning you up from your toes to your head

and, as you fade into brilliantly white nothingness,

it feels like falling through rain.

Facebook Fire

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Someone asked me if I am still writing. This someone had reached out on Facebook Messenger – I had not logged into FB for a very long time. One can say I have not been as in-depth with FB since Museveni blocked the internet in Kampala during the 2020 elections – COVID time. Once the net came back up over 2 months later (I think), I was already used to not checking FB.

I logged in and found a message request from a stranger that was from some weeks back. This stranger had asked if I wrote “The Car Ride” in Jalada Africa and I nervously typed in yes, unsure where this was going. He responded by saying he had been looking for me for some time.

Are you still writing?

There was no hesitation when I typed out that yes I was. It brought me back to me. I am still writing. I just have not written anything in a long time, submitted anything for publishing consideration. 2024 will be the year I return to writing.

One of my goals this year is to submit to 10 opportunities or more over the next 12 months.

I appreciate that stranger’s message. Firing me up to get back to me, to writing.

Let’s go.

2024

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So another year and another promise to write more. I decided to just wing it. I will schedule some writing time and just free write and whatever will pop out will pop out.

Raw. Unfiltered (but grammatically reviewed).

2024. I feel positive. I feel blessed. I feel ready.

Aus.

by

It’s the easiest love I never thought I would ever have

but it’s also the hardest love I never knew I could thrive through.

Your hugs are sloppy but tight,

your mapengo smile is so right.

We make pancakes on Saturday mornings,

jamming to your personal favorite, Chronnix.

Your laugh is loud.

This is the easiest love.

You are love.

November Goodbyes

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It’s been a dozen years now.

The date approaches, nerves and anxiety piling on

I always expect November to be crappy

because it is the month that I said goodbye to you

as you were lowered into the ground.

I try hard to smile and ‘think positive’ like everyone

on Instagram says to do…

But I remember what you meant to me,

and what your departure did to me

and I feel like it’s not fair to not give you that time,

to not give myself that space to sit and say goodbye again.

It’s been 12 years of November goodbyes,

reggae anthems lifted, salted tears let loose

sometimes on cheeks, some times within the soul.

Goodbyes are always awkward, flailing out on the tongue,

dancing out of sync with what your heart thinks you should be doing.

Melancholy accompanies these November goodbyes,

keeping them upright and squeezing any regrets right out of them.

Twinges of sadness accompany this melancholy,

and I give you time, I break away to give me time also.

Because

this goodbye is forever goodbye

starting back when that November broke my heart

and one that will follow me for the rest of my days.

Too what?

by

Too many jumps, high and otherwise

too little time, on the wrist and elsewhere

too high a risk, for the heart and everything else

too low a stretch, for sanity and all with it

too long a hold, for that forever and it’s accompaniments

too short a fuse, for a lack of answers and all suitability.