a simple place

in Mathare

She reached out her hand.
it was small,
delicate like a flower.
And when I held my hand
she tentatively took one of my fingers.

"How are you?"
Her voice was small and full of innocence.

While we held hands
a sea surged around us
"How are you, how are you, how are you?"

And beyond them a forest of hardened faces,
beaten down by years of compromised hopes,
and certain about the desperate
unfairness of the world. 

"How are you?" I ask
And a riptide of laughter
ran across the muddy path.

In the shadow of a nearby doorway
an older woman smiled
as the giggles bounced down the street.

We look at each other and she smiled again.
Her bare feet are dirty and worn.

Tags: Africa, Kenya, Mathare, slums

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 13th, 2011 at 8:06 pm and is filed under ENEMIES, Travel, Writings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.