I like to run my fingers in your hair and lock it in braids,
Braids of silver and coal,
Youth and old,
I like to make you an oasis of bitter sweet mix.
Fair woman, fair woman, fair woman.
I like to mint your fair name in gold coins
And deposit it in the fair bank of heaven
Where no moth, nor termite, nor burglar can break,
Black or fair.
Sweet tongue, sweet tongue, sweet tongue.
I like to hear my name in the sweetness of your tongue
Like mashed sweet potato sauce smeared in the air,
Rolls of cigarette smoke in a cold harmattan morning
“Etem, Etem, Etem”
bouquet of flying flowers.
I like to sit between furrows of spent heaps
And listen to your poetry
“Child be still, everything will be fine”
While you pluck tubes of small yams from lazy heaps.
I like to marry in your father’s house,
Momma,
Since I left your kitchen
I have not known a single smell of burning firewood
in my nose.
