04-10-2016, 09:02 AM
Many houses, one home
I have lived in many houses,
one home, the one we rented in Lagos
when I was seven. There the back wall
was Potty Boyler, batsmen's scourge
whom I faced, Grmzwd Dmpsy, wielding a wooden cloth beater,
against the ball bounced back
with a thwack from a wall grey as the monsoon sky.
The round, hard cushion in the living room was a log,
for Boaris Kolmakuk sailing down the Dostbritz,
mother of rivers, child of the Doster snows.
And when the winter sun poured in
through grilled windows, and sprayed off my tinfoil mirror
onto the distempered ceiling in missiles of light,
Theos and Halore were at war again.
With our lease, the lost battlegrounds,
the mighty Dostbritz; Gazooka, the living room divan,
and cricketers from planets in another galaxy,
expired, leaving their traces behind.
Even now, when life's disimagination hunts me out
I retreat into an alcove in my mind
where a rubber ball comes to me with a thwack
and love from Potty Boyler.
I have lived in many houses,
one home, the one we rented in Lagos
when I was seven. There the back wall
was Potty Boyler, batsmen's scourge
whom I faced, Grmzwd Dmpsy, wielding a wooden cloth beater,
against the ball bounced back
with a thwack from a wall grey as the monsoon sky.
The round, hard cushion in the living room was a log,
for Boaris Kolmakuk sailing down the Dostbritz,
mother of rivers, child of the Doster snows.
And when the winter sun poured in
through grilled windows, and sprayed off my tinfoil mirror
onto the distempered ceiling in missiles of light,
Theos and Halore were at war again.
With our lease, the lost battlegrounds,
the mighty Dostbritz; Gazooka, the living room divan,
and cricketers from planets in another galaxy,
expired, leaving their traces behind.
Even now, when life's disimagination hunts me out
I retreat into an alcove in my mind
where a rubber ball comes to me with a thwack
and love from Potty Boyler.
~ I think I just quoted myself - Achebe