D. Nandi Odhiambo
school
Nyasaye Nyakalaga (universe), the nyatiti, clacks,
grins,
jitterbug hops.
escarpments of telephone wires tether to poles,
frequencies fray,
histories disrupt sleep,
and a nation stumbles to its feet from internment camps,
hard wired to study by dying stars.
Wang Chieng (Eye of the Sun),
fortnights pass in classrooms
among crucifixes, jigger bitten toes,
pencils (of broken twigs) from the sausage tree,
and dung floors instead of exercise books.
Hono, (Worker of miracles),
lavender catchments bloat baobab trees (tipsy on sunshine, the sour taste of arabuonjo).
purple kidney beans sun on flaxen weave, speckled bellies up.
tea pickers haul baskets on crooked backs,
teetering in mulch like the dancer balancing the rudi.
at curfew, roads sprout tanks (tankers),
give way to spike strips.
lines of trucks tilt soldiers in tan berets.
squalls of dust settle in villages of thatching,
on corrugated iron rooftops.
Jahera (Of Pity, Mercy and Kindness),
nights keen with wind.
and while children hide beneath beds,
tractors gnaw the loping horizon
as a choir of aunties sings of land knotted in barbed wire.
world line
Msichana,
Senorita,
Cirrocumulus clouds backdrop your head,
space meeting rhyme-time.
essence to eidetic, crimson-billed birds.
Top-down, waiting out the turn,
back tires balding.
You lit, Up. The motherfuckin bess, yeah.
Changing lanes in, poisoned air.
While I sit, Wallet, full of pesos, on a belt clip.
God damn!
The wind slapping dust all over.
the un/becoming
Trap beats skillet blocks,
heckled by sunrise.
Piano gurgle,
abandoning half notes to pant in crabgras.
Ukuleles pluck at arrangements of imported perfumes.
Grills upchuck steaks, skewered with tangy sauce,
while a matrix decides which is the good life.
Plucks off hindlimbs.
Feeds on algorithms,
stats.
Your hand squeezing me between stars.
Runs of (plush) trumpet spiral galaxies,
scatter carbon.
Ellipses eclipse orbs.
And from a distance,
microchipped codes drop kick one hundred necklaces from drop boxes (in unmanned drones).
Drop kicked dropped one hundred necklaces hit,
diesel dumps,
hit,
innocent bystanding bystanders (smart zipzip codes zipped).
Your handsqueezing me between machines.
At sunset, fiddleheaded beats poke underfoot.
Fingers, flummoxed by rings, creak beneath welded skies.
And terse with sulfurous deposits, a phalanx of plexi glass shields ruffle (the hooded in) hoods
that lurch with tear gas.
Cordons of batons foreclosing on a clap back of jaws.
Drop kicked heart over heel,
the (un)becoming,
toss quietly,
(un)saying in fits that won’t adapt.
Your hand squeezing me between particles,
between 100 necklaces drop kicked,
between pleats and folds.
___________________________
Nyasaye Nyakalaga: The nyatiti is a traditional eight-stringed lyre that plays melodic and harmonic lines using strings made from animal tendons or nylon. The body is made from a hollowed-out piece of wild olive tree wood, and it is played by plucking the strings with the fingers while the musician sings.
Arabuonjo: sour beer is made from fermented millet or sorghum
Rudi: a slender stick decorated with colorful ribbons, beads, and feathers
D. Nandi Odhiambo is the author of four novels: Smells Like Stars, The Reverend's Apprentice, Kipligat's Chance, and diss/ed banded nation. He is the recipient of the 2018 Elliot Cades Award for Literature, and he is Associate Professor of English at the University of Hawai'i--West O'ahu. His latest book, The Minoritarian and Black Reason; a Philosophico-Literary Investigation, is a work of literary criticism. His forthcoming novel, Amapiano Eyes, is scheduled to be published by Book*hug Press in Spring 2026.
Photo by staff
