cut calls

Mar 12

I wrote this piece thinking about a land that I had to leave, a land I fell in love with, and a land that is indifferent to my existence in it.

Stagger, beads stroll down my face,

I am taken away from a land lost.

Who steals me from this land but my home?

She calls to me in an icy tone, suctions me towards,

I grab onto whatever I can hold,

though my grip has no reciprocation.

Held for so many days, so many warm nights,

like a newborn I am shoved into a world without choice.

Who calls upon me? I ask but receive no answer.

Warm winds whisper passive farewells,

they are wiser than I,

who clutches ghost hands that tickle,

who shouts at old sages that are stone.

Sitting in my home

The place that they tell me

I am from

I wait for a warm breeze

A soft tap of a drum

The pluck of a string

I hear these sounds

I am pulled

Only to look and see

That it is my own hand gripped around my wrist

And my own voice that whistles tunes

Gabrielle Gillespie

To Africa