By Kebba S Juwara
will find a bucket of water
Or a basket of water in small plastic bags for sale
On her lips are the continous rhymes
“ndoh bu seyda, ndoh bu seyda”
Her heels always
running to and from
To earn those
paltry noisy coins
from one customer to the other
At home, she’s
always the first to rise
She sweeps the house and cooks the meal
In her tender age;
she’s already turned
into a full fledged house wife ‘to be optimal’
She’s denied the chance
to have a normal childhood
She maintains the knack despite
her age like a draught animal
And like a burning wood,
every second gets more fierce
In his tender hands are the
hoe and cutlass for the farm
Under his feet are his worn out sandals
On his body are
the several torn out
clothes revealing his thigh, back, belly and arms
In his eyes mostly are several drops of
tears as he sees other children going to school
In his mind are several ‘good
reasons’ why he probes God’s grace
Sometimes you see him like a fatherless child
Lost to the system and strayed from the way a mile
With his anti social, decadent hippie lifestyle
His looks turn to ”ndeysan” and
”Astaghfirrllah”
Such are the consequences of
poverty,
and uncaring parental
upbringing respectively
#ThePanaceaPoet
