Mosi oa Tunya Literary Review ISSUE #2

MOSI OA TUNYA

t he smoke that t hunders

Literary Review

Iss u e 2 * J uly 2 0 2 1

Introducing

NDEBELE

POETRY

with Guest Editor

Philani A. Nyoni

Featured Author

Peace Adzo Medie

Featured Poet

Tanaka Chidora

Narrating Autobooks

Chipo Chung

OUR TEAM

FOUNDER & EDITOR

TENDAI

MACHINGAIDZE

CO-FOUNDER & EDITOR

ELLEN

MACHINGAIDZE

GUEST EDITOR

PHILANI A.

NYONI

ART DIRECTOR

BRANDON

PFUNDER

Hesi!

We hope you enjoy the first multi-lingual, pan-

African, online literary magazine from Zimbabwe.

COVER PHOTOGRAPH BY BEN MASORA

NDEBELE GRAPHIC DESIGNS BY ATUL TAWARE

BACK COVER PHOTOGRAPH BY BEN MASORA

SHONA GRAPHIC DESIGNS BY BRANDON PFUNDER

ETHNIC GRAPHIC DESIGNS BY VARLAMOVA LYDMILA

GRAPHIC DESIGN BY BRANDON PFUNDER

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C O N T E N T S

Letter From the Editor

3

English Poetry

4

English Fiction

14

Shona Poetry

39

Shona Children’s Stories

43

English Children’s Stories

46

Ndebele Poetry

52

Artwork

59

Featured Poet

62

Featured Author

70

Special Feature “Narrating Audiobooks”

74

Call for Submission for Issue #3

80

Dear Family,

Since 2020, the coronavirus pandemic has relentlessly devastated all parts of the world.

Quarantined for weeks to months, many have turned to the Arts for solace. The Arts - be

it film and television, music, dance, drawing, painting, books, or photography - have

brought light and hope to so many in this time when the world has been overshadowed by

tragedy and uncertainty.

In the past year and a half, I have talked to countless people who have mentioned how

they have discovered or rediscovered the artistic part of their being. During quarantine

in 2020, I myself rediscovered and brought to life my dream of creating a Zimbabwean

online literary magazine - a project that has filled me with a new-found optimism for the

future of our devastated world. The theme for our submissions of photography/drawings/

paintings for Issue #2 was “COVID-19” as a reflection of our collective experiences of

the pandemic.

Over the past six months, we at Mosi oa Tunya Literary Review have been thrilled to

receive submissions from all around the globe. In Issue #2, you will find African writers,

poets, and artists, from Zimbabwe, South Africa, Kenya, South Sudan, Zambia, Nigeria,

Ghana, UK, and Canada - a true pan-African collection of inspiring work. In Issue #2, we

also introduce the Ndebele section of our magazine, as we work towards publishing in all

16 of Zimbabwe’s official languages.

Following the publication of our inaugural issue in January 2021, Mosi oa Tunya Literary

Review received its International Standard Serial Number registration - ISSN 2710-2033.

Our team at Mosi oa Tunya Literary Review has also expanded since our first issue. In

Issue #2, we welcome Brandon Pfunder, our new Designer, and Philani A. Nyoni, our

Guest Editor for Ndebele.

We hope you enjoy reading Issue #2 as much as we have enjoyed curating it.

With love,

Tendai Machingaidze

Founder & Editor

PHOTOGRAPH BY TENDAI MACHINGAIDZE

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ENGLISH

POETRY

1. There are still poets

2. African Tears

3. Three Tides

4. African Hymns

5. Anything Desired

David Chasumba, Snr

Tarisai Mushamba

Wade Smit

Jennifer Mariani

Marial Awendit

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-There are still poets-

DAVID CHASUMBA, SNR

Though our liberators have become dictators

There are still poets...


There are still poets rhyming at this hour

Of tyrants who win at any cost

Of dictators snorting cocaine of power

And of young girls they deflower

Of liberators who have become emperors

Sitting on citadels of power

Of tyrants that do not empower

The starving masses.


There are still poets

With eyes to see tears, and ears to hear fears

Of the oppressed masses.

Though our liberators have become emperors

There are still poets to witness, as they must

The hour when emperors stumble

When citadels of power crumble

When dictators return to dust.

David Chasumba, Snr is a 47-year-old, Zimbabwean-born, short story writer and poet. His short stories

have been published on the Africa Book Club website and in the following anthologies: The Bundle of

Joy and other stories from Africa; Momaya Short Story Review 2015; and Small Worlds and Reflections

anthologies by the Brighton University Literature Society. His poems have been published in Tsotso

Magazine, Writers Scroll, Parade, Moto, and Mahogany. David used to be a member of BWAZ (Budding

Writers Association of Zimbabwe) in Harare. Currently, he is a Social Worker and lives with his family in

the town of Bexhill on sea, East Sussex, UK.

PHOTOGRAPH BY OLADIMEJI ODUNSI

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African

TEARS

TARISAI MUSHAMBA

PHOTOGRAPH BY GEMMMM on UPSPLASH

African Tree

Reading through the course of our history

To them poverty in Africa is a mystery

We had much to lose and they had much to gain

They took it all but still cause us pain

Whenever we fail we are still to blame

But with the pain you caused things were never going to be the same

Africans still cry

And you know why

We just admire things we can’t buy

But we are the ones who supply

You made us believe we were born to suffer then die

And because on you we were made to rely

Your demands we can’t deny

And your commands we can’t defy

When will these bitter tears dry

The world it breastfeeds

But its own it cannot feed

What future is there for our seeds?

You are the lock, but Mother Africa is the key

If you don’t agree just set us free and see

The old African tree.

Wild African Seed

Look at what this hate can create

A society that can dictate our fate

It’s poisoning the kids at a fast rate

We worship our enemies and call them great

We know their cultures but with ours we can’t relate

They have control of our mind

To what we can achieve, we are blind

We travel far looking for a life will never find

If only we would look behind

We would find all we need

Destroying our homes and killing our own

Around the world we roam

Looking for a better life

One you don’t have to move with a knife

But home is best

If only we would open our eyes, we would see we are blessed

But we want to go live out there where we are oppressed

We complain about stress

But our problems we don’t address

Daily we spend hours

Embracing a culture that isn’t ours

We can pray hoping the problems will go away

But faith without action is like a hungry bird that flies away

I hope Africa wakes up one day.

Tarisai Tadiwa Mushamba, 18 years

old, is from Harare, Zimbabwe. He

studied at Tynwald

High School and passed his ‘A’ Levels

with 11 points in Divinity, History and

English Literature.

He is currently waiting to go to

university

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WADE SMIT

Three Tides

Moving and Memory

A coastal town is where

Forest dreams collapse into the sea

And where the river gives its

Silty speeches about ages lost

A mountain town is where the

Roads are built on old sea beds

And where shells and fossils

Are the buried dust of dreams

Ocean Vapour

This is just the way

Beside the pile of autumn leaves

And fallen hibiscus flowers

Impepho grows slow like coral

Reaching into the air with

Gnarled but blossomed arms

Beneath which dragonflies and other

Fish find shelter

Amidst rays dappled

By the depths above

Eternal Waves

Having held myself ransom

Against the mercy of the waves

Oft did I breathe the unbreathable

And many were the times I woke with

Coral for teeth

Only free so long as I let go

Some tides would wrest my grip

From precious reefs

Whose marine populace had looked on

As their bane was lifted

And borne away by a current breeze

While my foot’s imprint served for an

anemone bed

No palm fronds did come for me

Bound by bitumen or aether

Instead algae and underwater weeds

Made a vessel of me

Perhaps both harbinger and barnacle

Not subject to water’s grip

Able, rather, to move through it and

Stone just as easy

Gliding as a faerie whose quarry

Is the earth entire

And like dust in Saturn’s rings

Not ransomable

Unredeemed and without Redemption’s very

walls

I returned to primordial matter

- The stuff of beginnings and endings

The mouth and tail of the snake -

Then breathed in the brine and the stars

Allowed ruptures to form

In the honeycombs of my marrow

And succumbed to eternal waves

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PHOTOGRAPH BY KYLE CUT MEDIA on UPSPLASH

Wade Smit, originally from oThongathi, in KwaZulu-Natal, is a PhD

candidate at the Historical Studies department at the University of Cape

Town. His research focuses on the conceptual history of umbuso in isiZulu

literature. He has written for the Amandla Liberation Heritage Route

project and Durban Local History Museums in English and isiZulu. He has

had two isiZulu short stories published by Vernac News, an inganekwane

titled 'Amahlokohloko Enyanga' ('The Weaverbirds of the Moon'), and

'Jiki', and has recently had an Afrikaans poem, 'Die Palimpses' ('The

Palimpsest') published in Yesterdays and Imagined Realities by Impepho

Press. He is also the founder of publishing house Kwasukela Books which

has published two isiZulu titles, Izinkanyezi Ezintsha by various authors,

and uManzekhofi nezaKhe by Fred Khumalo.

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A F R I C A N

HYMNS

JENNIFER MARIANI

S

I.

ing me a song of a land that is home

And I will sing you a song of Africa

An aria of river music and elephant song

Of baobab melodies reaching towards

the southern cross

I will serenade you with cicadas

after spring rains

The symphony of rustling red-gold grass

Bronzing the Savannah

beneath the piercing blue

Of a sky that soars

From the seas of the skeleton coast

To an ever-ascending Kilimanjaro

The sotto voce of the Serengeti

The anthem of warriors rousing

May we rise again

May we march ever onwards

May we sing evermore

Sing me a song of a land that is home

And I will lead you in a lullaby

Of bush babies and duikers

Soft murmurs in the sun-bleached valley

From the morning mists of Nyangani

To the crescendo of Mosi Oa Tunya

Thundering smoke carving a canyon

That stopped even angels in their flight

Here a melody of wood smoke curling from mud huts

The winter veld

dusk suspended at the edges

of the dying day

A dirge, a lament of loss

And Kraals of cattle dust red

Scattered cantatas, sweeping elegies

the pavane of the plains swelling

To the ballad of the dispossessed

Psalms of sorrow

Hymns of a land

Seared, scarred; a chorus of chaos

The wild, waltzing, wayward struggle

May we rise again

May we march ever onwards

May we sing evermore

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Sing me a song of a land that is home

And I will sing you

The reel

The requiem

The rhapsody

Of Africa

I will sing you

The song of you and me

Here we rise

Here we march

Here we sing

PHOTOGRAPH BY PAUL MILLEY

T

umbling like a waterfall

The years spill

Over devil’s cataract

The smoke that thunders

Carving a canyon

A cradle

For here we were born

And here we will return

We will lie in this valley

And turn to dust

The sun will smile upon us

And our bleached bones

All one -at last-

Will rise

Heavenward

We are home

T

II.

III.

he Sanyati stars skittered across the lake

A harvest of the Zambezi

Tamed against

Stone and steel

The kapenta rigs twined

Silhouetted across the Matusadona

Your outstretched hand

Pulling me along

Like the rose moon

Pulled the waters

Unknown between us

The music like crocodiles’ teeth

Glimmering in the darkness

And in that gloaming

There was possibility

The winter night

Warm

Rising from the valley

The day bleeding red behind

The dead trees

Dreams protruding like cadavers

From that strange sea

The cry of the fish eagle

Calling

And your hold on me

Reaching across the years

The memories sparkling

Like the silver edged night

And there we are dancing

Infinitely over the Buffalo grass

Spilling into each other

Like wine and moonlight and sorrow

Jennifer Mariani was born

and raised in Zimbabwe. She

currently resides in Canada

with her 2 daughters and

teaches at Alberta Ballet

School.

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ANYTHING

D E S I R E D

Marial Awendit

Anything desired

more than God

takes the throne

of God in my mind.

If my mind in all its labors

can birth me back to God’s palm...

My mind, my umbilical cord

To God’s tongue.

PHOTOGRAPH BY MARIAL AWENDIT

Marial Awendit is a South Sudanese poet and

essayist, born Dec. 1991. He writes from Yirol, Lakes

State. His poems have been published in Brittle Paper,

Kalahari Review, African Writer, Praxis Magazine

Online, Best New African Poets Anthology, Ramchiel

Magazine, and CreatePreneurAfrica. He won the 2016

South Sudan Youth Talent Award in the category of

Best Poet, and the 2018 Babishai-Niwe Poetry Award.

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ENGLISH

FICTION

1. "Ango" Leonard's Game

2. "Her Pain"

3. "Mutt and Runt"

4. "Long Sleeve"

Mercy Dhliwayo

Shylet Chabata

Tracy May

Stanley Gazemba

“ANGO”

LEONARD’S

GAME

MERCY DHLIWAYO

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A heavy cloud hovered

over the room that had, for

over two decades, been the

bedroom that she shared

with her husband. Although

physically strong, her spirits

sagged complementing the

funereal feel that saturated

the room. The recurring

dreams and sudden memories

of deceased loved ones that

besieged her mind with vivid particularity

as though a re-living of each memory, told

of the premature imminence of death. A

recurring dream that came to mind was

that of her sweet Jimson, who stood in a

white narrow passageway, inviting her

to join him: “Take my hand Lucia, Come

with me.” Lucia. She smiled at the sudden

recollection of her name. She had forgotten

she had a name. After the birth of her first

child, she acquired the title “Mai Lenny”

which was eventually replaced by “Gogo,”

a daunting title that once was exciting

to carry but gradually grew to seemingly

represent the dying of time.

After years of bearing that label, Lucia

grew to accept the fact that her name,

“Lucia Majhazi Moyo,” was now reserved

for her death whereupon the name would

be engraved on her tombstone for the

convenience of those who would care to

visit her grave. Lucia had also grown to

accept the chronology of life which began

with birth and was, in the natural course,

followed by infancy, youth, middle age and

then old age, which was inevitably eroded

by death. Having reached old age, Lucia

thus came to treasure every moment spent

with her girls, especially as she sensed the

sands of time hurriedly filling the base of

her hourglass.

“Maybe Uncle Leonard was right. Maybe

you should take a loan from the Policy.”

Lucia, half listening, gazed at the reflection

of her granddaughter combing her hair

before the mirror in preparation for school.

She smiled in appreciation of the girl’s

presence. She was not her daughter but

the girl’s presence was enough to bring

her close to her late daughter. “That might

be the only solution, Gogo. Forty one

thousand dollars is a lot of money, but the

value of this house is more than that. If we

lose the house we will not be able to buy it

back.”

“As much as I hate to say this, Phindile is

right. Two weeks have lapsed and less than

two weeks are left before the bank sells

the house. There is no way that greedy pig

will be able to raise that amount of money.

What do you say Ma? We need to save the

house.”

Lucia shifted her gaze to her daughter

PHOTOGRAPH BY LUCIAN COMAN

Sarudzai who was cleaning the old woman’s

room, a procedure she carried out every

morning before she left for the Shopping

Centre where she had her vegetable stall.

She admired her daughter’s tenacity

although her brutal honesty and constant

reference to her brother as greedy pained

her. “It is not greed, my child. Your

brother, like your father, just has too much

ambition,” she often said. Although the

animosity between her daughter and son

still pained her, for the first time, Lucia was

indifferent to Sarudzai’s attack on her son.

She had lost hope in her only son.

Lucia took her time to respond, and

when she did, the girls directed all their

attention to her.

“I have lived here for over thirty years. I

took care of this house, cooked and cleaned

for Mrs. Becker, and after her death, her

son allowed us to continue living here.

When we won Independence, he sold us

this house. Jimmy’s salary from the mine

and my salary from the kitchens was not

enough to buy this house, but he sold it to

us anyway. For twelve years, we paid for

this house bit by bit until every cent was

paid. We worked hard for this house.”

Lucia paused to wipe her saturated face

that seemed to have aged by a decade in a

space of less than two weeks.

“All of you were born and raised here. Too

many memories: some sad; some good,

but all precious. Right in this house I lost a

child, and in this house my first grandchild

was born.” She gazed at Phindile, whose

mother had died while giving birth to her,

and smiled. She bore so much resemblance

to her mother.

“I will not leave this house. Where will I go

at my age? I will not die homeless. Neither

will I die in Esther’s home. This is my home

and the only way I will leave it is when I am

dead.”

The nippy breeze that occupied his

grandmother’s room carried a certain

stillness that removed warmth from the

old woman’s body. In disciplined silence,

Ngoni, sucking his thumb, curled his

tiny body against his grandmother’s,

anticipating its usual warmth while

registering the intense and unfamiliar

emotion that masked itself on Phindile’s

face. In his four years of existence, Ngoni

had grown accustomed to two human

emotions. One of them was happiness: a

state easily attained through unadulterated

play in dirt and rubble with no adult

interference, pushing wire cars over coarse

bricks. His ultimate moments of happiness

were however experienced when he was

with his cousins Ronny and Feyi. Playing

with them was more fun than playing with

Meme, his uncle’s daughter, who was a crybaby

and often got him into trouble.

The other emotion was anger, which

occasionally manifested itself in the fiery

confrontations between his mother and

uncle. Although they lived in the same

house, a four bed-roomed house situated

in the Bulawayo suburb of North End, the

two siblings hardly spoke to each other, but

when they did, their tongues went ablaze.

Like in a recent confrontation between the

estranged siblings, his uncle’s eyes had

grown big, threatening to pop, while saliva

spurted from his mouth as he ranted about

something to do with the house.

“Are you happy now Sarudzai? I told you I

will pay off the debt, but you just had to tell

her. You just can’t keep your mouth shut,

can you?”

To this, his mother, a petite woman,

retaliated with venom that equally matched

that of her heavy-bodied brother. “Keep

my mouth shut? The house is about to be

sold and you expect me to keep my mouth

shut?”

“Yes I do. This is my house after all. I

can even sell it myself if I please.”

“You will not drive us out of this house,

Leonard. I swear on father’s grave. You will

not!”

At times like these, Ngoni often cowered

behind his mother’s rear, not daring to

leave her sight because of fear that his

uncle’s wrath would cause physical harm to

his mother.

Ngoni continued studying

Phindile’s face as she knelt before their

grandmother’s bed attempting to wake the

old woman for the lunch she had prepared

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upon her return from school. The old

woman did not move.

“Gogo,” Phindile whimpered. She was

definitely not happy. She was not angry

either. This new emotion was quite

an unnerving mystery for Ngoni to

comprehend. Attentively, Ngoni watched

and absorbed the aura as the sister he

considered big and strong broke down in

tears, not the way that he and Ronny cried

when they were beaten for being naughty,

she cried the way that he assumed adults

cried.

Ngoni was traumatized. Never in his life

had he seen a consortium of crying adults

who gathered solely for the purpose of

singing and crying. For two days, a dark

shadow loomed over his home summoning

in him an unfamiliar loneliness that

lingered despite the presence of Ronny and

Feyi who had arrived with their parents

two days earlier. Confused by the events

of the preceding days, Ngoni had not

noticed the absence of his grandmother.

It was only after he saw her peacefully at

sleep, in what was to him a humongous

white box, with her body exposed for

everyone’s viewing, that he realized her

absence. He felt no connection with the

sleeping old woman who, for as long as

he could remember, stayed home with

him and Meme daily when their parents

were at work and Phindile was at school.

She, like the numerous people who filled

their church, was a stranger to him. He

wished that everyone would leave and his

real grandmother would wake from her

slumber, sit him on her lap, and tell him

stories of adventures, talking animals,

strong kings, and brave boys who killed

giants. When she woke up, he would even

ask her why everyone around him was

crying.

But his grandmother never woke up. Ngoni

instead curiously observed the humongous

box, in which his grandmother lay, being

closed and later being lowered into a deep

hole in some strange place that he had

never been to before. Fear transfixed him

to the spot when he saw the distance from

where he stood to the bottom of the hole in

which his grandmother had been placed.

It numbed his body such that he could not

even move his hand, and kept his index

and middle finger frozen between his lips,

when his mother propelled him to scoop

some soil from a shovel and throw it into

the hole as everyone else was doing. On

their way back home, Ngoni gazed out of

the rear windscreen of the vehicle that he

and his mother were in and watched as the

place where they had left his grandmother

grew distant, and smaller, and disappear

into mere tarred road as they drove further

away.

The strangeness of what had just

happened, and particularly leaving his

grandmother behind, left Ngoni in fear

such that he clung to his mother even when

they arrived home for lunch with the many

strangers that had followed them home.

When his mother went to join the adults

gathered under the large mango tree at his

grandmother’s large suburban house, he

refused to be separated from her. While

the other children played on the veranda,

Ngoni sat on his mother’s lap and watched

attentively as the adults spoke.

At the centre of the congregated adults

stood, a short stout man, whom like the

majority of the present adults, Ngoni had

never seen before. He was addressing the

rest of the adults like a teacher addressing

school children. “And to my son, Leonard, I

leave my Bible.” The stout man was saying,

while reading from a document. Everyone

was attentive when he spoke and all eyes

were on him, so Ngoni too kept his eyes on

him. “I have found comfort in it over the

years and I hope he finds guidance and

redemption in it.”

Leonard chuckled at this and then smiled

as the stout man continued with his

reading.

“Last but not least, to my grandchildren,

Phindile and Ngonidzashe, I leave my

house, subject to the condition that…”

“What? Let me see that,’ Leonard,

suddenly not smiling, leaped from his seat,

cutting the stout man short. He charged the

stout and grabbed the document from him.

He browsed through the document quickly

and said, “This is surely an invalid will. I

inherited the house and everything when

Father died.”

“That is nonsense. Where does it say

you inherited everything? Where is the

will that says: I Jimson Ruramayi Majazi

leave everything I own to my son Leonard

Nyokanhete Majazi?”

Ngoni could feel the heat of his mother’s

breath above his recently shaved head as

she shouted at her brother.

“Sarudzai, I am not talking to you. Didn’t

mother teach you not to speak when men

are speaking? Besides, do you not know our

culture? It is the SON of the deceased that

inherits everything. We’ve been through

this already. Why are we even here?”

“To stop you from using this cultural

nonsense to steal from the dead.”

“You two stop it!” One of the adults from

the gathering interceded. The man was old

and rested his hand on his walking stick as

he spoke.

“Young man, Three years ago when my

brother died, this whole issue almost tore

the family apart. But, we all accepted that

Leonard, as the oldest and only son, had

inherited the house in accordance with

our customs. Now, this new will is saying

something else and is causing unnecessary

commotion and further divisions within

the family. Why not leave things as they

are? Leonard has been a good head of the

family. He has not kicked anyone out of the

house, has he?”

The stout man adjusted his reading

glasses and said, “Unfortunately Sir, the

law does not work like that. I respect your

customs, but the law has precedence over

customs, and the wishes of the diseased

cannot be disregarded that easily in as far

as it relates to their property.”

“But the house was my brother’s property.”

“Not according to the Title Deed of this

house or the purchase agreement.”

The elderly man directed his attention to

Leonard and asked him where the Title

Deed to the house was. Leonard did not

respond. Instead, Ronny and Feyi’s mother,

who had been quiet the whole time,

volunteered that the family was never able

to locate the Title Deed.

“That is because it has been in my

possession for safekeeping,” the stout man

said. I have been your parent’s attorney for

decades. I helped them with the purchase

of this house. Because your father was from

Malawi, your parents decided to have the

house registered in your mother’s name.

Even the purchase agreement is in your

mother’s name and I am not aware of any

change of ownership. This is a copy of the

Title Deed.” The stout man dug into his

briefcase and produced a document from

it. He walked past Leonard and handed a

document to Sarudzai.

Ngoni peeped at the document as his

mother browsed through it. When she was

done, she handed it over to Ronny and

Feyi’s mother who sat next to them.

“So does this mean that, legally speaking,

the house belonged to our mother and no

one else,” Ronny and Feyi’s mother asked

as she too browsed through the document.

“That is correct.” The stout man said.

“Give me that Title Deed, Esther. Let me

see it!” Leonard grabbed the Title Deed

from her and browsed through it. “This

does not mean anything. I inherited

everything from Father, including this

house.”

“Yes, you may have inherited everything

from your father. But, you only inherited

everything that your father owned. This

house, as you can see from the Title Deed,

is legally regarded as having been owned by

your mother.”

This response from the stout man did

not please Leonard. “You will be hearing

from my lawyer very soon! You can count

on that!” Leonard said as he tossed the

document back to

Ronny and Feyi’s mother before returning

to his seat.

“So what about the bank? Can it sell the

house if it does not belong to Leonard?”

Sarudzai asked.

“No it cannot. Because the house never

belonged to your brother, your brother

could not validly use this house as security

for a loan in the first place. The bank

therefore has no claim against this house

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and can only attach and sell property

belonging to…”

“Like I said,” Leonard interjected. “You will

be hearing from my lawyer very soon! So

can we please move on to the next thing?

When will we be receiving payment from

the life policy?”

“Leonard, we just buried Mother. Don’t

you think it is too soon to be discussing the

policy?”

“Well Esther, it is certainly not too soon to

be discussing the house shortly after we

just buried mother, so why is it suddenly

too soon to discuss the policy?”

“Your sister is right Leonard. This is

neither the time nor the platform. I will

set up an appointment with your sisters to

discuss the policy,” the stout man said.

“My sisters?”

“Yes, your sisters. They and Phindile are

the sole beneficiaries of the policy.”

“What craziness is this?” Leonard abruptly

rose from his seat again and was shouting

at the man. “I have a copy of the policy. I

am entitled to 40% of that policy.”

“Not anymore. Your mother removed you

from the list of beneficiaries over a week

ago.”

“You are behind this Sarudzai, aren’t you?

You poisoned mother against me! Well,

you will not get away with this! I promise

you!” Leonard was now standing in front of

Ngoni’s mother, his eyes red, and pointing

his finger at her as he vented. Ngoni

rested his head on his mother’s chest and

pressed his body hard against her in fear.

Instead of his mother embracing him as he

anticipated, she tore him off her chest and

dumped him on the ground and stood up to

respond to Leonard’s attack. At this point

Ngoni was close to tears, but Phindile, who

sat among the gathered adults immediately

attended to him and took him away from

the scene to the other children playing at

the veranda. As they walked away from the

mango tree, Ngoni could hear his mother

and uncle quarrelling while the other

adults attempted to intervene.

On the veranda, Phindile gave him a sweet

and urged him to play with the other kids,

but Ngoni was reluctant as he could see

his mother and uncle still quarrelling.

The children were playing wrestling and

Ronny being the only boy seemed to be

overpowered by the two girls Meme and

Feyi. After a few seconds of watching

Ronny being overpowered, Ngoni decided

to join in the game and come to Ronny’s

aid. In no time, the tables were turned and

the boys had Meme lying flat on the floor.

Ngoni picked up one of the pillows left at

the veranda by the women and threw it

on Meme’s face. Now he and Ronny knelt

beside Meme’s body laughing nonchalantly

as she wriggled her body attempting to set

herself free from beneath the pillow that

covered her tiny face.

“We got you now! We got you,” the boys

chanted victoriously as they pressed the

pillow harder against her face ensuring no

escape.

“Stop it! you are hurting her,” Feyi cried.

When the boys would not stop, Feyi ran to

get help. Ngoni could hear her screaming,

“Aunty! Aunty, Ngoni and Ronny are

hurting Meme and they do not want to

stop.” This did not stop the boys from

enjoying their victory until they heard the

sound of a woman screaming. Startled by

Amelia’s scream and Leonard’s bellow, the

playing boys directed their attention to

Meme’s hysterical mother and her father

who aggressively charged towards them

barking, “You bastards! Get away from

my daughter!” Leonard’s huge masculine

hands clutched the boys’ necks before

and they were roughly tossed aside. Their

hostage was scooped from the ground

where she lay and rushed indoors.

While Amelia frantically fanned her

daughter, Leonard rushed to their bedroom

to collect his car keys. Instinctively Ronny

and Feyi’s mother, who was a nurse,

approached the child in an attempt to

shift her position and administer mouth

to mouth resuscitation. Amelia, however,

aggressively warded her off accusing her of

wanting to kill her child.

Overwhelmed by what had just

occurred, Ngoni and Ronny ran out of

the house and hid behind one of the cars

parked outside. While still nursing the pain

from being thrown against the concrete

floor, Ngoni’s heart pounded as he saw his

mother charge towards them with a fire in

her eyes that usually only existed when she

quarreled with his uncle. She was definitely

angry and the fiery slap that landed on

his face, blinding him, was a definite

confirmation of this. Ignorant of the wrong

he had done, the terrified boy screamed in

pain and internally vowed never again to

play with Meme.

“No, Saru.” Phindile ran to Ngoni’s rescue

and grabbed him from his mother’s grip.

“He is just a child.”

“A child who plays like this?”

“At least you know there is something

wrong with that fatherless bastard of

yours. For all we know, he could have a

murderer’s blood running in his veins.”

This was Leonard. He had just walked out

of the house with his wife beside him and

his daughter in his arms and was placing

Meme in his car.

“Leonard please! Can we not fight right

now and just take the child to the clinic?”

“Oh, now you care about my child. Bloody

murderers!” he shouted, before driving off.

Sarudzai turned her attention back to her

son, who buried his face away from his

mother’s wrath behind Phindile’s dress,

while struggling to maintain his position

as Ronny too jostled for refuge behind the

girl’s petite rear in fear of his aunt’s strike.

“You boys will tell me this instant...Where

did you learn to play like that?”

Without much coercion, Ronny, having

been pushed from his position of safety,

pointed at Ngoni.

“Tell me now, before I slap you again.

Where did you learn to play like that?”

Sensing that the attention was now

directed to him alone, and in fear of

another strike, Ngoni shouted loud enough

for everyone to hear, “Ango Leonard!”

“Well your uncle is not here to help you.

Now talk.”

“Ango Leonard,” the boy repeated, “I learn

it from Ango Leonard.”

Sarudzai went silent for a few seconds

then knelt before her son. She turned her

son’s body towards herself and rubbed his

shoulders gently.

“I am sorry my baby. I will not hit you

again. Mummy was angry because you hurt

Meme. Now please tell mummy where you

saw what you and Ronny were doing to

Meme.”

Conscious of the silence and attention

he was receiving, the panting boy failed

to talk. Sarudzai raised her hand in an

attempt to wipe away his tears, but the

boy mistook her intentions for another

imminent strike. He shouted in terror,

tears running down his face and mucus

down his nose, “Promise mama. I saw it

from Ango Leonard. Me and Meme.” He

paused for breath and continued, “Me and

Meme, we were playing hide and seek and

I hide in granny’s war-dop. Granny was

sleeping. Meme come in but she did not

see me, but I see her. Ango Leonard also

come in when Meme was gone and granny

wake up.”

Breathing heavily, Ngoni wiped his snotty

nose with his arm, drawing a line of mucus

from his nose, across his cheek, and to his

left ear. “And granny ask Ango Leonard

‘What are you doing in my bread-room?’

Ango Leonard then take a pillow and put

it on granny’s face. Then Ango Leonard go

away and granny go back to sleep.”

Sarudazi’s eyes widened and her jaw

dropped. “When was this, my boy?”

“The day the ambu-lence come and take

granny to hospito.”

Mercy Dhliwayo, also

known as Sista X, is a

creative writer and hip

hop and spoken word

artist from Zimbabwe

who is currently based

in Polokwane, South

Africa. Her work includes

poetry and hip hop

mixtapes such as the UN

World Trade Organisation

2013 Mixtape and The

African FemMc’s Vol 1

Mixtape. Her writing has

been published in New

Contrast, Tyhini, Femrites,

Nothing To See Here, East

Jasmine Review, Kalahari

Review, and The Bundle

of Joy and other stories

from Africa. She released

her debut short story

collection, Bringing Us

Back, in December 2020,

and her debut hip hop

and spoken word album,

The X A-Gender, in 2019.

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HER

PAIN

SHYLET CHABATA

PHOTOGRAPH BY JIDE SALAU

There was the evidence. He was

happy, and she had no part in

his happiness. She had been

relegated to a face on the phone,

a few minutes, every few weeks.

His Gogo was now his Mhamha.

It was painful, but what could she

do?

His face beamed with

tiny milk teeth, confidently

smiling towards whoever had

held the cellphone that took the

photograph.

He was wearing an

expensive tracksuit, like the ones

she had seen advertised on the

popular online catalogues on

Facebook. He was sitting on one

of those little scooters that easily

cost 50 USD.There was no way

she could afford that. “I have to

stop feeling sorry for myself. It

is better for him,” she thought.

“How could I possibly afford

any of this stuff for him? This

is better for him.” It was a lame

attempt at consoling herself.

Hot tears pricked her eyes. She

could taste the salty tears as they

tricked down her throat. Her

weak attempts to keep herself

from crying never worked. She

collapsed into a fetal position on

the cheap bed that filled most of

her tiny room.

Her sweet baby,

Zvikomborero, was growing up

without her. It was like no other

loss she had experienced. She

couldn’t explain it to other people. Her

child was growing up with his paternal

grandmother, healthy, well-looked after,

and happy. So, what was the problem?

Couldn’t she appreciate the help she was

getting?

It was not that she wasn’t thankful.

It hurt that she did not have a relationship

with her child. She remembered the day

when she had made the heart-wrenching

choice. The day when she and her tete had

met her prospective in-laws, to inform

them about her pregnancy. This train of

thought just made her sob more loudly as

she stifled her pain into the pillow.

Michael’s mother had made it clear

that she wanted her child to have a future

unimpaired by a college girl that had

unwittingly fallen pregnant by him. “Yes, it

might be his pregnancy and our grandchild,

but it doesn’t mean that we want a muroora

now. We will pay for the medical bills

and the baby’s upkeep until the infant is

weaned then we will foster our grandbaby.

That way she can also go back to school.

Our son still needs to continue with his

education. What will he give the child if he

has no education? We can take care of him

and the baby, but taking responsibility for

the girl is beyond our capability.”

She remembered turning to Michael,

but as soon as their eyes met, he looked

down. With horror, she realised he wasn’t

going to fight for her. He was ready to

abandon her. This was the end of their socalled

“love.” How could she have been so

blind? Had her hunger for love brought her

to this moment? What of all those promises

he had made when their love was a raging

fire? Everyone at their university had

predicted their eventual marriage.

She recalled the silent journey

back to her Aunt’s house. Her tete’s

disappointment was palpable. She had

wished that Tete would shout and scream

at her, but she did none of those things.

There was just a stoic expression on her

face and sadness in her eyes.There was

nothing she could say to make it better.

What could she say to the woman who

had sacrificed so much to see her through

school up to this level.

A knock on the door brought her

back to the present. The neighbour’s

daughter, Ethel, shouted at the top of her

voice, “Mhamha said to tell you that the

water is back.”

“Thank you,”' she shouted back.

She wiped her tears away, as she so

often did, and put on the neutral face she

presented to the world daily. She picked

up her empty buckets and opened the door

as light dappled through the canopy of the

mango tree that stood outside.

Slowly, she shuffled towards the

communal tap which she shared with

the other tenants of her aunt’s house.

A multitude of buckets and containers

were piled around the tap, resembling the

leaning tower of Pisa. Obviously, Mai Ethel

had called her only after she had made

sure she had filled all her containers with

water first. Luckily the two brothers who

occupied the other single room on the

far end of the house were away at work,

so she could fill her buckets without any

disturbance. The next-door neighbours

who seemed to never pay their water bill

and always begged for water had been

evicted, so that nuisance was long gone.

With the first full bucket, she flushed

the toilet in the outhouse that stood next to

the communal tap. It was a simple concrete

structure with azure and brown cracked

tiles arranged in a haphazard geometric

mess of colour, a broken shower head that

would jet down a stream of cold-water,

a door that hung on squeaky hinges, and

a toilet that once had been white but was

now a creamy-yellow colour from the

various chemicals that were used to wash

and disinfect it over the years.

After three full days without water,

the occupants of the house had resorted to

urinating in the bowl and not flushing to

save water. Mai Ethel had not bothered to

flush the toilet now that the water is back.

She sighed and wished for the day when

she could afford to rent a room with her

own private bathroom.

As she filled the rest of her buckets,

she daydreamed of how one day she would

afford to live in a better place and afford to

be together with her son. How she would

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23

spoil him with new clothes, and send him

to a good school. He would hug her and call

her Mhamha once again. As these thoughts

raced through her mind, tears started

seeping from the corners of her eyes. She

quickly wiped them away. Even if she was

in pain, she would not allow anyone to see

her crying, especially in the ghetto where

gossip mongers took their trade seriously,

as if they were paid to cruise around with

the latest news.

Water with a strong chlorine smell

trickled into the last bucket, and with the

efficiency of a familiar routine she carried

the buckets back into her room. Her next

assignment was to fill the assortment

of empty drink zvigubhu that she had

amassed beneath the makeshift scullery

that she shared with the two brothers. She

would fill them with water that she would

use for washing her utensils. The brothers

would steal some of it. But, it was not a

big deal to her, since they often assisted

her when she was really broke and needed

money or food.

Her simple job as a cashier at a

tuck shop that sold groceries at wholesale

price did not give her much of an income.

Usually by the end of the month, she

would need to borrow money from the two

brothers for transport. If it were not that

her aunt allowed her to occupy a room at

her rental property for free, she would

likely be living in deplorable conditions.

It was a hand-to-mouth existence. Just

enough money to survive, but not enough

to better oneself. There was no prospect

for upward mobility. Stealing from her

workplace had crossed her mind once or

twice, but the danger of being caught and

locked up, and potentially never seeing

her child again was too risky. Everjoy, her

workmate who always seemed to have

enough money for Brazilian hair weaves,

artificial nails, and takeaway lunches, had

been arrested and was rumored to be

serving an 2-year prison sentence. It was

not a fate that she wanted to share. One day

she would find a better job. She would not

give up hope. Her Sociology degree would

benefit her one day.

By the time she finished filling the

zvigubhu, it was late afternoon and soon

the sun would have set behind the tightly

packed rows of houses. She went into

her room, emerging with maputi and a

mug filled with mahewu. She sat on her

stoep to absorb the last rays of the sinking

sun, listening to the constant chatter of

the neighbourhood. She could hear the

gurgling of the taps of other households

the occupants also filled their water

containers. The city’s water supply was at

its most unpredictable. Life was hard in the

Harare ghettos.

The setting sun warmed her

chocolate skin and she closed her eyes,

trying to relax. The gurgling taps, the

children playing with their chikweshe

in the street, the hooting kombis which

were at the shops a few streets up the hill,

hwindis vying for customers, and the loud

voice of Mai Ethel through the window. She

had visitors, the bi-weekly meeting of the

gossip squad. Mai Ethel’s voice was always

loud, especially during the numerous

arguments she had with her husband. She

never seemed to be able to talk in a normal

tone. That is how she had found out that

Baba Ethel had his salary docked because

of missing machine parts at his work.

“These girls of today! Not caring

for your own child.. Being a woman is

being strong. You don’t give your child to

strangers,” Mai Ethel pontificated.

“But what was she supposed to do?

She had to let her child be looked after at

her in-laws so she could go back to school,”

a soft voice retorted.

“Didn’t she finish school? She should

take the child now.”

“You are being unfair. Who would

look after her child whilst she goes to

work?”

“You are speaking of things that

you do not know. Isn’t she my housemate?

don’t we lodge together?” Mai Ethel argued.

“These girls of today, they think getting

pregnant is the easiest way to get rich. She

probably thought she had found a shortcut

to success by forcing that boy to marry her.

But, the in-laws were ahead of her. They

blocked her. They are smart,” Mai Ethel

chuckled.

“I think she has done well; she

hasn’t gone looking for a blesser, and she

is working hard and looking after herself.

Maybe she will find a better job and be

able to look after her child,” a third voice

chimed in.

“Take her child? Don’t bet on that!

She is probably glad now that she can look

for a new lover and get married and forget

about that child. And as for not having a

blesser, I am not sure about her so-called

friendship with those two boys we share

the house with. They are too friendly, if you

ask me,” Mai Ethel continued relentlessly.

“Mai Ethel, do not judge her too

harshly. Mugoni wepwere ndiye asinayo.

You don’t know what your kids will do in

the future.”

“Not mine. My babies are wellbehaved,

and I would never let them

embarrass me like that. Thank God her

parents are no longer alive to see her

embarrass them like that. I remember

her mother was such a beauty. Even more

beautiful than me. I am a 9 and half and she

was a 10.”

“Hehede! Mai Ethel don’t hoot your

own horn.”

“What are you saying? Am I not

beautiful? Look at all these curves! It is this

business of getting married that has ruined

my looks.”

And just like that, the conversation

had moved on to a new topic, without

the single thought of how they had just

assassinated her character.

Such cruelty. Such pain. She could

hardly breathe. For a split second, she

considered storming into Mai Ethel’s

rooms and cursing them out, but she knew

it would be futile and would only give the

gossip squad more fodder to chew on.

She stood up, slunk away quietly

into her room, and for the second time

that day, she collapsed in tears onto her

dilapidated bed.

Shylet Chabata is a Zimbabwean writer from Harare. Her love for

the written word has propelled her evolution from a reader to a

storyteller. Shylet is a wife and a mother of one, who has an everready

smile and an insatiable curiosity about the world at large. This

is her first published work.

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24

MUTT AND

RUNT

TRACY MAY

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The great spotted beast leapt on

Master, ripping and tearing his flesh.

“Maiwe!” his master screamed. “Help!

Help!”

As he’d been trained, Mutt jumped

at the leopard in an effort to save his

master. Although the dog wasn’t small, he

was no match for the great cat. It turned,

as if flicking away an annoying fly, and

flung the dog into a thorny acacia shrub.

The dog yelped once and fell silent. When

Mutt woke up, all was quiet around him.

He sniffed the air...Nothing. Whimpering,

with blood trickling down his leg, he got

to his feet and limped over to his master

who lay unmoving in a crumpled heap. The

villagers had come running, but it was too

late. The man was dead.

Some of the villagers turned on

Mutt, yelling, “You stupid, useless dog! You

were supposed to protect him!” This was

followed by a swift, sharp kick. Yelping in

pain as a boot connected with his already

broken ribs, Mutt slunk away into the bush.

After wandering around for days,

through the bush and into a nearby town,

Mutt found a hole to hide in behind a Bar

and Grill. There was a faint scent of past

hole dwellers - a Civet Cat, a Spotted

Genet, and a Warthog family. He knew their

smells well. Mutt stayed there for days

recuperating, until one evening, as the sun

raced below the horizon, the rattling metal

drums that improvised as grills, and the

wafting clouds of smoky meat, drew him

out of hiding.

Like a jackal, he slunk and sniveled

amongst the dustbins of the town. Mutt

had grown weary of all humans and had

quickly learnt that a menacing growl

coupled with his size meant that most

people would leave him be, except when

he stole food. Sometimes, he would sneak

between the weaving legs of the town's

drunks, hoping for a dropped morsel. If the

bar owner saw him, he would throw boiling

water at him. Most of the time he missed,

but Mutt could still feel the searing pain on

his back from the times he didn’t.

“You’re a bloody menace!” the

owner would yell.

“What’s wrong wit h that stupid

mutt?” shouted Scarface in frustration.

“He’s not hunting rats anymore!” With a

sigh, he kicked the cowering dog, followed

by Amos who was scrubbing the floor. He

stomped off in search of yet another beer.

“It's okay boy. I saved you some food,”

PHOTOGRAPH BY CAMILO FIERRO

whispered Amos, as he dug into the pocket

of his tattered shorts for a crust of bread.

He hated the way the dog was treated by

Scarface, beaten and starved half to death.

“Hunger will turn the Inja’s into vicious

hunting and fighting dogs. The better the

hunter, the better the money,” Scarface

would shout cruelly. This dog was too

small for hunting leopards, but had been

allowed to stay, since he was a good ratter.

“Good dog. You miss her too,”

murmured Amos, watching him as he

wolfed down the crust of bread. Amos’

mother had loved this dog too, but she was

now a faint memory of Lux Beauty soap

and sloppy kisses.

Later the boy and dog were lying

in the corner of his cage, when Scarface

burst in with a crash. Staggering over to

the huddled pair, he grabbed the dog and

roughly tied an old bloodied rope around

its neck, pulling the struggling dog away.

Amos tugged on Scarface’s arm and begged

him to have mercy on the dog. Smacking

the boy across the head, he pulled the

squealing animal away. Amos never saw

the little dog again, his last reminder of his

mother.

Things got worse for Amos after

that day. One-night Scarface came into

Amos’ room and grabbed him yelling,

“Your mother was a whore and now so are

you.” He chucked him in the direction of

a leering man who stood in the doorway.

Grabbing his prize, the man grinned wider

and pulled the kicking and screaming child

into another room and closed the door.

“Stop your fuss, Runt! It’ll be over

soon,” yelled a voice from behind him.

Using the only weapon he had at his

disposal, he bit into the arm that held him.

Screaming in pain and shock, the drunk

man dropped his prize, giving Amos the

time he needed to turn and flee. Angry

shouts from Scarface had followed him

through the darkness as his bare feet

pounded down the dust road.

For days, Amos slept hidden under

scrubby acacia bushes, terrified that he

had escaped one animal only to soon be

eaten by another. Many times, he thought

about going back, especially when the

hunger pains were strong. At night when

he lay huddled under yet another bush,

he would remember the dog, his warmth

and his gentle licks on his face. The licks

had reminded him of his mother, before

she had gotten the skinny sickness. After

she had died, Amos had been left with his

uncle, Scarface, and her little dog. Now

both the dog and his mother were gone.

Amos wandered far and wide looking for

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food. Staring at a large road sign, he tried

to work out what it said. In the end, he

shrugged and trudged into the next town.

Eyes wide, Amos stared at the bustling

people who hurried about with cameras,

chatting excitedly. Following a large green

truck, Amos came to a beautiful shady spot

with lush green grass that was filled with

canvas huts in all colours, shapes and sizes.

As Amos stood and stared, a pale woman

brushed past him. He shrank back.

“Sorry,” she said hastily, glancing back at

the bedraggled boy.

A horn sounded, she sighed, turned

back to the urchin, shoved the package

she held into Amos’ hands, and with a faint

smile hurried off in the direction of the

sound. Sniffing tentatively at the parcel,

his stomach growled. The smell of food.

Behind a building he tore at the wrapping.

Just as he was about to devour the burger

he found, a hand snatched it away.

“Wena. You. What are you doing?” A voice

had snarled. “This is our spot. We don’t

take kindly to strangers muscling in on it,

do we boys?”

Looking up, Amos saw a group of

large boys leering over him. The brute who

had spoken had his fist raised. Squeezing

his eyes shut, Amos waited for the blow.

When none came, he opened his eyes to

see an even larger boy who had stopped the

fist in mid flight, twisted the attached arm

painfully, and casually said, “Leave him be,

Philemon. He’s just a kid. Now Hamba. Go.”

The boy smiled at Amos. “New to town hey?

I’m Jabu. What’s your name?”

Shocked, Amos stared at the grubby,

grinning boy. He was tall and lanky, and

wore a pair of shabby trainers that stuck

from his feet like boats. Amos was unable to

speak. He glanced wearily over his shoulder

in case the other boys returned.

“Nah, they won’t bother you again. I am

here to protect you now.”

Jabu turned and picked up the package that

had been dropped in the dirt and wiped

the packet on his grubby trousers. “Here.

What’s your name?”

“I’m Runt,” replied Amos.

“You can’t be called Runt,” snorted Jabu.

Shrugging, Amos replied, “Someone long

ago used to call me Amos.”

“Welcome to Victoria Falls, Amos,”

replied Jabu, flinging his arms wide. “Stick

with me and I’ll show you the tricks of the

trade.” Even then, Jabu had been aware of

the potential advantage of Amos’ small size.

Over the next few weeks, Jabu had been

true to his word. He showed Amos the best

campsites to fleece visiting tourists and

the marketplace where they shopped for

curios. “These stupid tourists come to this

marketplace to buy these ugly trinkets.

They are too busy looking at this junk to

notice us,” a grinning Jabu told Amos.

All the years with Scarface had taught

Amos to be quick on his feet and nimble

with his hands, and due to his small size,

most people didn’t suspect him. Jabu was

impressed. “You’re good at this, Amos my

man.”

They lived together in Jabu’s

homemade tin shack behind the old

forgotten railway carriages. Each day they

would return home with their spoils. Amos

tried nicking the best in an effort to earn

Jabu’s praise. Then, one day after a busy

day at the marketplace, Jabu vanished.

Thinking that perhaps Jabu had returned to

their tin shack hideaway, Amos ran home,

eager to show off his latest prize. But Jabu

had disappeared, gone without a trace,

leaving Amos on his own once more.

Without the protection of Jabu, the older

boys turned on Amos again and he had to

be exceptionally quick during his visits to

the lucrative campsite or the marketplace.

If the boys had caught him, a beating would

surely follow. He was not big enough or

strong enough to fight back yet.

“You be careful Runt!” the boys would

chant. “Maybe the tokoloshe will get you.

Yeah, the boogeyman will get you like he

got Jabu and Zenzo and Vusa.”

The bigger boys chased Amos from

the tin shack, and he was forced to find

shelter on the streets. In his nightmares,

the tokoloshe always had the sneering face

of Scarface. Amos was forced to retreat to

the darker parts of the town, areas where

the local drunks lurked in the shadows.

The music from the Bar and Grill

thumped loudly, as Amos hid amongst bins

behind it. Hunger eventually forced him

from his hiding place. He spun around at

the rattle of a dustbin lid, ready to run if he

had to. A low growl alerted him to a dirty,

battered dog, which had knocked over the

lid of the bin. Amos looked at the poor

creature and saw himself in its eyes.

“Hello.”

“Grrrr.”

“I won’t hurt you. You must be hungry too,

hey.”

Mutt stared at the small scrawny

human, his teeth bared. Why doesn’t

this boy run away? The boy looked much

younger than the teenage boys who came

to play on the football table outside the

grocery store. Those boys would shout and

throw rocks at him. Amos dug into the

pocket of his grubby oversized shorts and

pulled out a moldy crusty piece of bread.

A few weeks earlier, Amos had been lucky

to find a discarded shirt and shorts in an

old bin. They swallowed him, but he tied a

string around the waist to hold them up.

They were good shorts with lots of pockets,

useful for storing food and other items.

“I have been saving this, but I guess you

can have it.” He held out his hand to Mutt.

Another growl. Placing the bread on the

ground, Amos slowly backed away, talking

soothingly to the dog.

“Good boy. Good dog,” said Amos

softly. “You remind me of a friend I used to

have, but you are bigger, much bigger. You

are like a lion eh,” muttered Amos. “You

and me, we are the same. See I have scars

too.” Amos showed Mutt the scars he had

on his limbs, the small round burns made

by cigarettes and the many marks from

many beatings.

“Come. We will look for food

together.” The boy beckoned softly to

the dog and turned around to rummage

through a bin.

“Pizza!” shouted Amos gleefully,

sending Mutt cowering back.

Amos broke it in half and placed one piece

on the ground. “There you go, shamwari.

Good dog. Hey...That’s a good name for you,

my friend. I will call you Sham for short.”

Cocking his head to the side, Sham listened

to the boy's soothing voice. It had been

days since Sham had eaten, and after yet

another run in with the bar owner, he was

sporting a fresh burn. This boy’s soothing

voice was unfamiliar. Most humans either

feared him or threw things at him.

Over the following days, Sham

followed Amos about and Amos gave him

food whenever he found something. Slowly,

Sham started to trust his new friend.

Amos and Sham expertly dodged

a beer bottle, as they fled with their latest

spoils.

“Not bad, Sham. One sausage, two

buns, and a piece of nyama with a bone.”

Amos chucked the meaty bone to the dog,

who attacked his meal gleefully, all the

while his tail wagging at the sound of the

boy’s cheery voice.

“That old fatso at the Grill was too

slow for us, eh.” Chuckling, Amos tucked

his long slender legs under him and

attacked his meal too. “We’ve learnt a trick

or two over the years, haven’t we Sham? We

make a good team, hey.” Once their hunger

had abated, the friends curled up together

under the shade of a tree.

“That dog will be good for leopard

hunting. A decent size,” a figure leaning on

a nearby white van muttered to himself.

He looked intently at the boy. “Wait

a minute...Is that Runt? He has grown.” He

grinned and the jagged scar across his face

pulled his lip up in a sneer. “How fortunate,

two for the price of one.”

A while later, just as the sun was

setting, the friends ambled along the main

street in town. They watched tourists

clamber about in safari vehicles or have

photos taken in front of the grubbing

warthogs. “Tourists are crazy,” said Amos,

tapping the side of his head. “Why have a

photo taken with an ugly warthog?”

As the crowds thinned and it grew

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darker, they strolled away towards their

spot behind the Bar and Grill. Sham

stopped suddenly and growled, a low

fearful growl.

“What’s wrong boy?” Another growl,

then a voice from the shadow spoke.

“Well, well well. Look who we have here. I

thought you were dead. Come here boy.”

That voice! Surely, it cannot be. Turning

slowly, Amos saw Scarface leaning against

a van, clutching a beer bottle in one hand.

Sham growled again, sensing Amos’s fear.

“I lost money because of you, Runt.”

Scarface staggered towards them. It wasn’t

his first beer of the day. Shaking, Amos

felt urine trickle down his leg, as Scarface

leered over him, trapping him against the

wall.

“You shouldn’t have run away,

maggot,” he spat. “No one to clean pots

now or service my friends.”

Breaking the bottle against the wall,

he pushed the jagged end into the boy’s

face. Struggling, Amos cried out and Sham

leapt to his friend’s rescue, biting into the

hand of their tormentor. With a shout,

Scarface dropped the boy and swiped the

bottle at the dog. Sham released his bite as

the bottle connected with his neck. Seeing

their chance to get away, Amos and the dog

ran for their lives.

“Come on. Don’t be like that. Come

back, nephew. I won't hurt you,” slurred

Scarface, but Amos and Sham were long

gone.

Days later Amos and Sham found a

new hiding place under a secluded bush

along a large river. Jabu had once told Amos

that there was a huge waterfall nearby that

the local people called ‘The Smoke that

Thunders.’ Amos and Sham could hear the

thundering sound from their hiding place.

It lulled them to sleep for hours of much

needed rest after their trauma.

Woken by hunger pains, Amos and

Sham ventured to the marketplace to look

for food. Amos managed to nick a small

purse and a Ham and Cheese sandwich.

from a blond lady. She was so busy

haggling over a carving of a giraffe that she

didn’t even notice the boy and his dog.

In a dark alley behind a row of

curio shops and safari business, Amos

and Sham devoured the sandwich. After

they had eaten, Amos turned the purse

over in his hands. It looked expensive. He

rifled through its contents and noticed

that there were mainly American dollars

hidden in the folds. A good score. Tucking

the notes into his ripped and filthy shorts,

Amos was about to toss the wallet into a

dustbin when he noticed a photograph of

the blond woman with her arms around a

small brown and white dog. There was also

a business card with a rose flower emblem

in the middle with children holding hands

surrounding the flower.

With a sigh, Amos replaced the cash,

photo, and card in the wallet. The way

the woman held the dog in that photo...

his emotions were all over the place.

Somewhere deep down, Amos knew that he

was going to have to find this woman and

return her wallet to her.

“Come on, boy. Let’s return this

wallet to the nice lady then see if we can

find something else to eat at the campsite.

The overlander should have arrived by

now,” muttered Amos to Sham.

“Did the tokoloshe get you or maybe

a witch?” jeered a voice suddenly, stopping

them in their tracks.

Philemon stood in front of Amos blocking

the entrance to the campsite. “Best run

along now.”

“Leave us alone, Philemon. Or else I

will set my dog on you.”

“Not with my new friend here to

protect me,” sneered Philemon, as he

stepped aside to reveal none but Scarface.

Not waiting a second longer, Amos turned

and fled, with Philemon and Scarface

close behind. Hearts pounding, Amos

and Sham raced through the streets,

weaving and dodging through people and

cars. Adrenaline surged through bodies

and propelled them forward, but Amos

noticed that Sham was limping and falling

behind. He turned to help his friend and

half carried and half dragged the dog away

from those who chased them. There was

only so far they could get in their state.

Eventually, Amos collapsed in exhaustion

in front of a white building. Sham collapsed

on top of his friend and master, panting but

prepared to attack anyone who attempted

to touch either of them.

“Come I will take you to your dog. Slowly

though, you are very weak.”

With Jabu and Jenny’s help Amos

stumbled out into the bright sunshine.

Sham came bounding up to him, his tail

wagging.

“Sham, is that you? I hardly

recognise you.” The dog bounced around

Amos happily.

“He refused to leave you,” said Jenny.

We treated his wounds and fed him for

you.”

Amos opened his eyes to blinding

white lights above him. Could this be

heaven? All white and clean. Jabu had once

talked of such a place. He tried to get up,

but his body felt weak and his legs were

rubbery and refused to work.

A kindly voice spoke to him. “Hello Amos.

Do you remember me?”

“Jabu? Is that you? Are we dead?”

“No,” chuckled Jabu. “We are at an

orphanage called Children of the Rose. It's

a place for street kids like us.”

“I thought the tokoloshe got you…”

Looking at Jabu, Amos could see that he

had changed over the years. He was taller,

sure, but most importantly he was clean

and sported a bright white shirt and smart

grey shorts.

Another voice spoke then. “You’re

awake. I’m Jenny. I see you found my wallet.

I must have dropped it in the market.”

Turning towards the direction of the voice,

Amos saw the pale blond woman from the

photo. She was smiling.

“We’ve met before, I think, when I

first came to Vic falls. I gave you food...a

burger. You are the reason I stayed here. To

help kids like you.”

“Where’s my dog?” shouted Amos,

as all of a sudden the events of the last few

days rushed back to him.

“Relax. He’s safe and waiting outside

for you. You were both in a state when we

found you. Luckily, Jabu saw you outside in

the street and ran to help you.”

Smiling, she held out her hand,

Amos stared at her, wary of her kindness.

Over the coming days, Jabu showed

Amos around the orphanage. He saw

many familiar faces...The missing children

that had mysteriously vanished from

the streets. Amos smiled. The tokoloshe

children had not been taken by the

boogeyman afterall, but had found a home

at the orphanage, as had he and Sham.

Tracy May was born and raised in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe. She now lives

in Hereford, England with her two children, husband, and springer

spaniel. She has worked as a Safari Guide and Lodge Manger in most

of the larger national parks of Zimbabwe, and in South Luangwa

National Park in Zambia. Tracy has also worked as a Photographer

and a Human Resources Assistant. She is currently working on her

first book, a children’s story, set in Zimbabwe.

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Sleeve

STANLEY GAZEMBA

PHOTOGRAPH BY MAREK PIWNICKI

A battered fan squeaks as it whips

the turgid air that is barely circulating

in the long narrow hall, the dusty rotors

twisting like an old man with a disfigured

spine tortuously making his way up the

stairs, every time it comes to the end of

a full rotation. It hangs on a long cable

from the cement roof above the bar-man’s

metallic cage, adding a touch of elegance

to the otherwise dour ghetto pub still

swathed in last Christmas’s tinsel. Beneath

it, the owner, a shrew-faced little man

who likes to wear his old coat inside out,

as if to demonstrate his destitution to any

potential bad boys from the neighbourhood

intent on a hold-up after official hours,

blows over and sips his tea from a chipped

tin mug and watches his fares through

the grill, waiting for the tired harassed

waitresses he employs to bring orders.

Behind him his worldly wealth -

beer bottles with dust on the shoulders

standing alongside incongruous wines and

spirits of nondescript manufacture and

vintage, that have always been there since

the pub was opened, and which no one

drinks, share the prison cage with him,

lined up carefully on wooden shelves such

that their labels are fully exposed, prim and

quiet as a queue of barefoot village children

at morning assembly, waiting to have their

fingernails inspected by the duty master.

I take a long pull of my cigarette

and blow a long column into the face of

the guy leaning across the Formica table in

front of me, oblivious of the “No Smoking”

sign hung above the bar cage. The old

man would not dare kick me out to go

smoke in the corridor outside because I

am one of his faithful regulars. Besides,

he occasionally sees my picture in the

newspapers, and I know that he is secretly

proud that I patronize his old dump.

There are hardly any customers in the pub

anyway.

My drinking mate squints and

snorts, his brow scrunching up as if he is

working out a delicate piece of arithmetic.

There is a filter-less Rooster cigarette

tucked behind his ear like a village

carpenter’s pencil, which he had tried to

light up earlier but reconsidered. He still

holds the grubby coins the bar-maid gave

him for his change for the half-bottle of

moonshine he bought. As I watch him

crunch the figures, trying to see if he has

been taken to the cleaners, I am wondering

if he is drunk already, given he has just

come in.

His is an interesting face, all the

same, broad and shiny like polished

mahogany, the forehead sloping backwards

slightly, pronounced jaw sticking forward

such that his chin is set slightly forward

than his lips. But it is the nose that gives

him his character, flat with flared nostrils

that are so round you can see the individual

hairs lining the inside as they dilate in

his excited breathing, framed by huge

bloodshot eyes that can either retreat back

into his skull or dilate into giant tsinzuni

berries, depending on his prevailing state

of excitement. It is an open face that

doesn’t hide the wearer’s emotions.

He has been smoking weed in the

narrow corridor outside the toilets, and

I can smell it clearly on his breath and

stained fingers as he leans closer. But,

he is still somewhere between high and

intoxicated, steadily working his way into

his comfort zone with the moonshine, after

which I know he will become withdrawn

and surly and either leave on his own or

be ordered to leave by the proprietor. He

once flattened a stubborn drunk with a

pile-driver, knocking out three of his front

teeth, and sending him to cool his heels in

the cells for a while before his people bailed

him out. He has an older sister who lives

in Germany who sends Euros whenever

she is convinced he is in serious trouble,

otherwise he is expected to fend for

himself cutting wood for rich snobs in the

Westlands and Spring Valley area, using the

Husqvarna chainsaw she bought for him.

He is not a stranger to me.

For a while we sit in companionable

silence, listening to the antique music the

old man at the counter is playing on his

turntable – yes, turntable. The wacky old

man still uses that, occasionally treating

us to some scratchy vinyl mugithi foxtrots

that he probably danced to when he was

still a young man, dating crack-heeled

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village girls back in his home in Murang’a.

We tolerate him all the same, together

with his cathode-ray-tube Panasonic TV

that huffs and hisses whenever he turns

it on at news time, as if dispelling doses

of radiation to the patrons to aid them

along to their early graves, alongside the

moonshine its owner sells. Those antiques

keep the neighbourhood bad boys out of

the dump, which allows us to enjoy our

drink without worrying about someone

nicking your wallet, or following you on the

way home. The tired barmaids he employs

are also not in the habit of carrying white

prescription tranquilizers concealed

beneath their fingernails, and which can do

strange things when slipped into a man’s

drink. After all this is Nairobi, a city where

everyone turns into a hunter at sunset.

In the drawn-out silence my

drinking mate stirs. “I know that you write

stories,” he says, taking a sip of his drink

and grimacing as it goes down. “Do you

think you can put me in one of them?”

I look at him blankly, caught offguard,

my eyes narrowed. “Maybe,” I shrug.

“If you can give me something interesting,

yes.”

“But you don’t know my name, do

you?” he asks, leaning closer, a cunning

look slipping into his eyes.

“I know you.”

“But not my name.”

“Osama.”

“No, that is not my real name,” he

says, laughing. “That is what people call

me, but is not what is on my ID card. That

is the name of that Arab terrorist who blew

up planes in America.”

I sit watching in silence, waiting,

noting the way his nostrils dilate even more

in his excitement.

“Anyway, you see this scar over

here?” He points at the long gash running

down the length of his left temple, and

which has intrigued me all this while

we have been talking, partly because it

reminds me of Maori warriors I had seen in

a YouTube documentary.. and Mike Tyson.

“Do you know how I got it?”

I shrug, holding out my hands.

“It is my mama who gave it to me.

With a ladle. You know those big sticks they

use to pound ugali? Well, that one. The old

woman gave me a nice whacking on the

face with one...eh! She would have killed

me!”

I wait as he takes another slug and

smacks his lips, his eyes sparkling and

drawing further into his skull with the

recollection.

“I had just cleared Class Eight,

and was eager to know adult things. You

see, I was a grown up now, ready to shed

my shorts and start wearing trousers. I

had some money saved up, and since I

had finished my chores at home, I said

to myself, ‘Why not pay the mzee in my

neighbourhood whom I had heard so

many stories about a visit?’ He was a sort

of legend in our village, and whenever

his name came up in conversation the

lads would smile knowingly. There was

something about him that made me want to

know more.”

“And so I took my bath and scrubbed

the farm mud off my feet and put on a dash

of Vaseline. Then I put on my brand new

Savco jeans and the viscose shirt that my

mother had bought for me and my Sahara

boots. I combed my hair carefully in the

mirror and added a dash of perfume. I

looked nice. You see, I was on a mission,

and I needed to look good. And the reason

I was going to see the old man was because

I wanted him to help me get the courage.”

He grins and winks his Cyclopean eye at

me, and I wink back knowingly.

“So I set off, whistling softly to

myself, and feeling good, you know. I meet

some of my guys along the way, but then

their banter about the politicians in Nairobi

and Premier League football is not very

interesting, and so I dismiss them and get

on with my business. Soon I arrive at the

old man’s compound. It is rather bushy and

quiet, and for a while I think there might be

no one at home. But then I hear snatches

of conversation coming from the back, and

so I weave my way through the tall grass,

taking care not to pick up burr on my Savco

and Saharas, and approach the back of the

leaning old hut.”

“There are indeed people there,

these two guys I know from the village

who are always hanging out together like

thieves, seated on a bench in the little yard

behind the old house that is tucked into a

grove of banana trees. I put out my hand to

greet them, but they ball their fists and we

bump ‘gottas’ instead, their brown teeth

shining like roasted maize cobs.”

“‘Karibu, Osama, you are looking

good,’ the taller guy with the bloodshot

eyes says, making space for me on the

bench. ‘You must be going on a date.’”

“His friend laughs and blows smoke

into my face. They are smoking a thick

cigarette rolled out of old newspaper, and

the smell of it is exhilarating. It is actually

what had brought me here. One of them

hands me the cigarette stub, ‘Smokers

always like to share the cancer with

someone else, you know,’ he says, grinning.

I am tempted to take it, but then I hesitate,

and he withdraws it and instead hands

me a tiny glass he is cradling between his

feet. Drinkers also like to share the liver

problems. ‘Come on, karibu!’ he bawls. I

take the glass and take a small sip, just a

small one. I then hand it back as the stuff

burns its way like fire down my throat. The

two guys laugh and continue smoking. You

see, up to now I had only drank mama’s

tea and millet porridge, and the occasional

mug of grain beer. I was the choir-leader

at the village church and all that. But you

know what? I was getting rather tired of all

that crap and was ready for the things that

men do. And those two thieves seemed to

know that.”

I take a sip of my drink and examine

my drinking mate keenly, trying to see

where that broad scarred face would fit

in a church choir. He notices where my

thoughts are drifting and laughs. “You don’t

believe it, do you?” he says with a raised

eyebrow, taking his Rooster cigarette from

behind his ear and twirling it in his hand

for a while before putting it back. “I was

choir-leader, bwana, it’s not a lie. I was

the best tenor in that choir. I even played

guitar!”

“Okay,” I say. “I wasn’t doubting.”

He takes a sip of his drink and

grimaces again, before getting back to his

tale. “Anyway, so the old mzee hears me

speaking and comes out, knowing there

is a customer. He is holding a bottle and

glass, and we exchange greetings, with him

slightly surprised because he has never

seen me there. But then it is business, and I

reckon he is saying to himself, if the young

man can pay, why not. He moves to pour a

shot, waiting for me to state the amount I

want, but I restrain him. ‘I want the other

one,’ I say, holding up two fingers to my

lips. He grins, noting my unease with his

keen eyes.”

‘“Can we step inside?’ I am nervous,

because someone who knows my mama

could come around.”

“‘Sure,’ says the old man, ushering

me into the house.”

“The smell inside is full of mystery,

as if I have stepped into some forbidden

cavern where secret knowledge is stored

and dispensed. It is both exhilarating and

a little frightening. When my eyes adjust to

the gloom I notice that I am not the only

customer. There is another man inside, a

young man from the village who is vaguely

known to me, and who, just like the two

corn-toothed fellows outside, isn’t quite

an honest customer in the eyes of the local

administration. He lifts his head with a

little difficulty and nods, before going back

to minding his business, which is staring

transfixed at a glowing pot of coals that

lights up in an eerie way whenever he

takes a drag through the plastic straw he is

holding, causing his face to be illuminated

in the gloom like a black magic scientist in

a movie.”

“The old man pulls a low stool for

me and I sit down.”

“‘So, which one do you want? I have

the short sleeve and the long sleeve. Which

do you prefer?’ he asks me from the smoky

fireplace where he has something warming

on the dried-cow dung fire he is stoking

back into life.”

“I’m wondering how to respond, but

then the other customer in the place saves

the day and I simply point at what he is

taking. ‘Ah,’ says the old man with a gasp.”

“‘The long sleeve! That one is the best, I

tell you...so long as you take it slowly and

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are not in a hurry, just like your friend

over there.’ Something about the old man’s

manner reminds me of that man from West

Africa they called Charles Taylor, do you

know him?’ the other customer asks me,

eyeballing me over the rim of his glass. ‘Do

you know that crazy man whose thugs used

to ask their victims if they wanted a short

sleeve or a long sleeve?’ I nod.”

“By then, I am thoroughly intrigued

by the smells in the place and the air of

imminent mystery. I am ready to receive

my baptism into adult things and I decide

that I might as well go the whole hog,

after all, don’t the Moslems say that if you

choose to eat pork, you go for the fattest

pig?”

“We agree on the price and the

old man goes about his preparations

as I watch, the air growing even more

conspiratorial the more I watch the fellow

bush scientist seated across from me

inhale. I can’t wait to get into that quiet

meditative dream world in which he has

seemingly slipped, hardly noticing any of

us in the room.”

“The old man brings over a curious

set of equipment and arranges it in front of

me, giving me mumbled instructions as to

how it works as he goes about setting up.

In the gloom inside the hut he might have

been a shaman setting up the gear for a

complex voodoo ritual. There is a shallow

pewter pan half full of coals on which a

small earthen pot rests. There is some

boiling water inside the pot because I can

see it giving off steam. There is another

curious container, like a stained glass

demijohn resting inside this primitive and

yet complex distillery, out of which a long

clear plastic tube protrudes. I think there

is also another appendage like a gourd

through which I can hear something like

pebbles rattling, but I am not sure, since

the hut is filled with smoke. I am too eager

to get on the trip to bother about the rest of

the details.”

“‘Okay, here you go,’ says the old

man, taking a drag out of the straw to

test its potency before nodding with

satisfaction and handing it to me, blowing

a column of smoke expertly over my head.

I take out my brand new wallet and feel

very grown-up as I peel out the old man’s

money and pay him. Then I settle squarely

on the low stool and get set to unravel the

mysteries of the queer-looking distillery.”

“The first drag I take from the

pipe is tentative, since I am not quite

confident what will come out. I notice

though that angry bubbles rise inside the

glass demijohn as I suck. And then the

smoke hits the back of my throat and I

experience a sensation that I have never

found the words to describe - a bit tingly

and at the same time sweetish-sour with a

tart head, almost like sucking on a lollipop

made out of peppermint and cinchona

gum. I try to isolate the various flavours

on my tongue to find out what the old man

used to flavor it, but I soon resign myself

to enjoying the experience instead. ‘Why

look for grubs in your mushroom soup?’

I say to myself. ‘They might just be the

reason why it is so tasty!’”

“‘Hold it down in your chest for a

while,’ says the other guy in the room,

pausing from his own experience to give

me some lessons when he finds out I

am a novice. ‘That way you get the full

flavor of the herb. Thereafter let it out

slowly through clenched teeth, like so,’

he demonstrates with his own pipe. I do

as instructed, and on the third drag it no

longer feels so bad.”

“But it is not the taste that intrigues

me as I suck down deeply, rather it is

the tiny explosions I hear coming from

inside the pot, and which sound like twigs

snapping or pods popping off inside my

head, going twa! . . .twa! . . .twa!. I would

later learn that it was the dried seeds of

the weed popping, and that to make it

even more potent, part of it is grown in

a graveyard by the peddlers. It is all so

strange, almost musical, and I pause to

listen, my ear cocked, almost choking

on the smoke inside my chest. Twa! . .

.twa! . . . twa! it goes again, and I grin in

the darkness, feeling like I’m on a big

adventure. The other guy watches me and

laughs softly to himself.”

He pauses to tip back the last dregs

at the bottom of his glass, his eyes glowing

and squinting with the recollection. Yet

again, he reaches for his Rooster cigarette

and debates whether to light up before

changing his mind and tucking it back

behind his ear. I signal the waiter to get

him another drink, so he can continue with

his tale.

“Anyway, I end up spending over

an hour there, a leisurely lesson in the

life of men. And by the time I rise up to

go I am so giddy-headed I feel like I am

walking on a sponge...or a cushion of air.

The old man claps me on the shoulder and

grins, and sends me on my way. I note that

the yard outside is now getting crowded

as the evening hour descends. My two

accomplices who had offered me a spliff

earlier on are still lounging on the bench,

but now their eyes are glazed and unseeing,

or maybe it was mine that were unseeing, I

cannot tell.”

“I had intended to work up enough

courage at the old man’s hut to go and

visit a girl I had been eyeing in the

neighbourhood, but who gave me the fright

because she was in high school, a whole

two classes ahead of me, and spoke fluent

English, through the nose like a white

woman. I was wearing my Savco jeans and

the Saharas for her. Now as I stepped out of

that mzee’s compound, I was no longer so

sure. I opted to go home and relax a little

so that the weed could sink in. To be fully

honest with you, now that I was walking on

a cushion of air, everything started going

downhill rather fast, and I can’t lie to you

that I remember all the details.”

He pauses to take a sip of his drink

to wet his throat, and I can tell from his

expression that he is working himself to

the climax of the tale. So I lean forward,

all ears, my drink forgotten. Although

he speaks with a lilt, he has an engaging

way about him that compels you to listen.

Maybe it is his eyebrows that have started

to twitch as he gets worked up, or that

crude scar running down the length of his

face that turns his smile into a rictus on a

warrior’s face...I have no idea.

“My brother, somehow I made

my way back home from the old man’s

compound, even though I don’t know

how. You see, the chemistry in my head

exploded furiously...I think it was the

oxygen in the fresh air outside that did it.

Anyway, the next thing I knew was that I

was stark naked in my mother’s compound,

stripped down to my underwear, and was

screaming my head off, trying to get away

from demons that were chasing me around

the compound.”

“My horrified screams alarmed

my mother in the garden where she was

tending her vegetables and she came

running. When she realized I had run mad

and that no one could approach or control

me, she ran to the village headman’s

house nearby to seek help, at her wits end

with fright at what she had witnessed.

The headman quickly organized a band

of strong young men and they rushed to

our compound and overwhelmed me,

pinning me to the ground and tying up my

wrists and ankles with nylon ropes they

untethered from the cows. Still, it was not

that easy,” he says, his big eyes lighting

up out of his skull. “Che! That thing gave

me the strength of ten men, I tell you, and

the first time they tried to approach me

I swung my arm out like this and felled

three of them to the ground! I tell you, I

kicked one of them so hard he yelped like a

woman in labour! No joke, bwana!” he adds,

laughing. “I was like that Samson in the

Bible!”

“Anyway, eventually they managed

to overpower me and loaded me onto a

wheelbarrow and we set off for hospital.

They had to keep dashing cold water from

a jerry can onto my face to keep my head

from overheating, just like with an old

car radiator. And now and then, when I

threatened to break loose, they would lay

in with vicious slaps to keep me down in

the barrow. I tell you, I saw cha mtema

kuni that day...ho- hooo! My ears were

slapped so hard they were ringing ndiiiiii!...

ndiiiiiii!...as if I had a nest of wasps in

there.”

“I must have passed out at

some point, because the next thing I

remembered was opening my eyes and

staring up at the white ceiling of a ward

at Kakamega District Hospital. I tried to

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get up to take stock of my surroundings,

but you know what, mister? They had tied

my wrist to the beds with a dog’s chain! I

lay on my back for a while, thinking how I

came to be found in that place that smelt of

medicines. There was another idiot in the

bed next to mine who kept moaning in his

sleep as if he had been told that Satan was

coming to harvest us with his fork. I wanted

to get up and slap him to shut him up.

But then I couldn’t move. They had stuck

a needle in my left wrist and water was

dripping inside from a bag hung on a stand

beside the bed. There was a dirty mosquito

net suspended on the roof above me with

flies stuck in it, some still struggling to

get out through the mesh. The people

who ran that place certainly did not know

cleanliness.”

I stare at his tobacco-stained buck

teeth, bulging eyeballs, and cavernous

flaring nostrils, and nod earnestly.

“When the doctor eventually came

in, he stood at the foot of the bed looking

at me, his head angled slightly, a curious

smile playing on his lips. ‘So, you are

awake at last, aren’t you, kijana?’ he said,

toying with his stethoscope. I looked back

at him and said nothing. Dressed only in a

hospital gown, I had suddenly remembered

my Savco jeans, viscose shirt, and Sahara

shoes. Had the people at the old man’s

hut robbed me of my treasures? I also

wondered if next they wanted to take me

to the cells, given they had chained me to

the bed. It is the reason why I was playing

dumb with the doctor, stalling for time as I

tried to figure out how I would escape.”

“The doctor turned and nodded as

my people filed into the ward, my mother,

my sisters and my uncles, all looking

worried as hell. I am the last-born at home,

you see. I watched them through slitted

eyes and continued to play dumb, some of

those uncles were my sworn enemies.”

“‘Have you given him an injection?’

asked my mother, her face scrunched up

with worry.”

“‘There is no need for that,’ the

doctor reassured her. ‘The young man is

fine. All you need to do is take him home

and have him fed, and thereafter ensure

he rests well.’ He then raised a finger, the

curious smile of earlier on returning to

his face. ‘Just make sure that he stays away

from those things he consumed when you

brought him in, that is all.’”

“‘You mean that is it?’persisted my

mother, unconvinced. ‘You won’t give him

an injection?’ Old folks back in the village

have a lot of faith in an injection, you see,

and in their eyes a visit to the doctor is

never complete without one.”

“‘No, I won’t give him anything,’

said the doctor, preparing to leave. ‘He is

fine. Just give him his clothes and take him

home.’”

“They hustled together some coins

and hired a battered old taxi to take me

home. I sat squeezed in the back with my

people and felt important, like a minister

whose entourage had come to pick him at

the airport. The only difference was that

hardly anyone was speaking to me.”

“When we got home my mother

brewed up a pot of millet porridge and sat

me in the shade outside our house to eat.

She was still strangely silent. After I had

sweated my way through three calabashes,

I belched and sat back.”

“‘Have you had your fill?’ she

asked, hovering over me like a hen over

her chicks. I nodded. ‘Good,’ she said,

gathering the dirty dishes and heading into

the house. That is the point when I should

have gotten up and ran, had I been in my

senses,” he says, his huge eyes glowing with

fervor. “But I guess my mind was still fuzzy

from the effects of the weed.”

“When that old woman returned she

had turned into a mad woman, and was

wielding the big ladle she used to pound

ugali whenever we had visitors from the

church. ‘You say you are fine now, eh?’ she

fumed, her eyes aglow. ‘That is good. Now

I will show you who changed your nappies

and suckled you at the breast, you small big

man!’”

“Before I could register what was

happening, I was rolling on the ground,

blows hammering into me from all

directions, trying desperately to protect

my head with my arms. That old woman

is strong, my friend. Eh! She wanted to

kill me! In no time the big cooking stick

had broken to pieces. But she still hadn’t

had enough. Like a possessed dervish she

dashed into the house and reemerged

wielding a big piece of wood from the

firewood stack. It was a movie, I tell you,

with me howling my head off as she chased

me around the compound, raining blows

on me as if she was killing a snake....

heh! Had the neighbours not rushed in to

restrain her I swear she would have killed

me that day.”

He pauses to catch his breath,

his moist face still twitching from the

recollection. “That, my friend, is how I got

this scar on my face. She split my cheek in

two. And I was lucky. It would have been my

skull!”

“So, what do you think, my friend?”

he asks at length, staring into his almost

empty glass. “Are you going to put that into

your book?”

“Maybe,” I lie. “It will depend on

whether the publisher likes it.”

I send him another drink, seeing

as he has earned it, and that I plan to sell

his story without giving him a share of the

profits.

“So, did you do what the doctor

advised?” I ask when his drink arrives. “Did

you stop going to the old man’s house?”

He looks at me steadily for a while

before an oafish grin splits his face. Then

he gets up to go and smoke his Rooster

cigarette in the corridor outside.

Stanley Gazemba is a storyteller from Kenya. His novel, The Stone Hills of Maragoli,

was published in the USA under the title, Forbidden Fruit. It won the Jomo Kenyatta

Prize for Kenyan Literature in 2003. Stanley is also the author of Khama (shortlisted

for the Wilbur and Niso Smith Adventure Writing Prize, and which was published by The

Mantle in September 2020); Ghettoboy (shortlisted for the Kwani? Manuscript Prize);

and Callused Hands. His collection of short stories, Dog Meat Samosa, was recently

published by Regal House Publishing in the USA. His latest novel, Footprints in the Sand,

will be published in Sweden in 2021.

His articles and stories have appeared in several publications including The New York

Times, World Literature Today, Nairobi Noir (Akashic Books), the Caine Prize Anthology

‘A’ is for Ancestors , Man of the House and Other New Short Stories from Kenya (CCCP

Press), and The East African magazine. His short story, Talking Money, was featured in

Africa 39, a Hay Festival publication which was released in 2014.

In addition, Stanley has written several books for children, of which, A Scare in the

Village, won the 2015 Jomo Kenyatta Prize (English Children’s category).

Stanley lives in Vihiga, Western Kenya, where he continues work on other

writing projects.

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SHONA

POETRY

1. "Ndinochemera Ramangwana

Renyika Yedu"

2. "Hope Hadzina Ndima"

3. "Dandemutande"

Florence Tinevimbo Mungure



Ndinochemera

Ramangwana

Renyika Yedu

FLORENCE TINEVIMBO MUNGURE

Nyika zvoyonanga kumawere takatarisa!

Vanotaura vanoti ramangwana riri mumaoko evechidiki.

Zvino vechidiki vacho zvavava kusweroraradza,

Vachawanepi nguva yekurongera ramangwana?

Paunobvunza kuti idoro rudzii rinodhaka vana zvakadai,

Hanzi pamwe musombodhiya, bhurongo, maragada,

Kana zvimwewo…

Vanwi vazvo vanoti ukasangwara pakunwa unoora mazino.

Havo vodira nechekuhuro kuti zvisagumhe mazino.

Njere dzamapenzi, kuhwanda mvura mutsime!

Wokoshesa mazino nekuti ari pachena,

iwe uchichetura ura nechiropa nekuti hauzvioni?

Wozoona hako kurapatika kwavanenge vaita mumigwagwa.

Padzabatira ndipo panorarwa.

Hope dzacho dzinenge dzedzikirira.

Nyangozunguza zverudzi rwupi, hapamukwi zvekumhanya.

Munhu anogona kuita muswere wese akangodaro.

Tsananguro yoti, kumbozorora kubva kunhamo dzepasi rino.

Ukaera watatapurana nezvinodhaka, munobva matoumba ukama

Unenge wongorarama upenyu hwekuzvitsvaga

Zvinokusveta kamari kako kese, sare wangove munhu

Mhedzisiro kubira vanhu

Ko ungaite sei wave muranda wezvinodhaka

Amwe ava mashiripiti ekuguma kwenyika

Chokwadi vanhu vangatore mushonga wechikosoro kuita doro

Mapiritsi avarwere vepfungwa akawanirwa rimwe basa

Zvinokanga mate mukanwa

Zvinopedza simba

PHOTOGRAPH BY YURAKRASIL

Siyanai nekatsika aka muzvipe nguva yekuronga ramangwana

Zvinopawo rudekaro kuvakuru venyu

Vanooneka nyika nerufaro vakuru venyu

Vachiziva ramangwana riri mumaoko akanaka

Vakuruwo morega kuneta kurovera masoro

Ndambakuudzwa anozoonekwa nekusiya jira mumasese

Achiziva zvake kuti akamboyambirwa

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Hope Hadzina Ndima


Zviroto, zviroto!

Ndizvo zvega zvaunogona kuwana kuhope

Zvochida kuti iwe ubve wati kwanyanu

Kunoshandira zviroto zvako kuti zvizadzikiswe

Hope dzinokugadza umambo hwausina

Musikana ava nemakore achikuramba

Kuhope anogona kuva wako

Ndege chaiyo unoikwira kuhope

Ugoenda kunyika dzakasiyana-siyana

Nyangonakidza sei, nyika yezviroto haina anogara

Unotokudzoka chete wozotarisana nechokwadi choupenyu hwako

Pasuru dzaungabva nadzo kunyika yezviroto ndiwo mabori nembovha

Gara wadziita shoma hope

Nekuti hadzina ndima

Kuguta kushanda

Rugare kushanda

Gohwo rinobva mudikita

Mudikita ndimo mune dovi

Kuita ushamwari nehope kukoka nhamo

Wochiitira godo kune vanozvishandira

Wopumha uroyi nehusipo

Wotanga kuona madivisi nezvikwambo zvisipo

Unove mutoro munharaunda yaugere

Shanda urege kuremera vamwe sechitunha!

PHOTOGRAPH BY JAVARDH via UPSPLASH

Dandemutande


Rauya dandemutande reruzivo nekufambisa mashoko.

Warara wasara!

Kana usati wariziva ritsvage.

Rinokurerutsira upenyu hwako.

Vana vechikoro vowana ruzivo vasina kuvhura bhuku.

Vangatadziswe nei irwo ruzivo ruzere padandemutande?

Kumukira kubhanga kunotumira mari, kuda hako.

Vakaziva dandemutande voita zvese vari muutepfetepfe hwedzimba dzavo.

Dandemutande ratoisa mabasa evanoshanda mumabhanga panjodzi,

Asi richirerutsa upenyu hwevaridzi vemari.

Vakagara vataura vakuru kuti kuipa kwechimwe kunaka kwechimwe.

Hurukuro nehama dziri kure hadzichadi mazakwatira emari.

Dandemutande robatsira kuumba ukama pakati pehama neshamwari.

Inyore nyore kutaurirana nemunhu ari mitunhu nemitunhu kubva pauri.

Isaruraude padandemutande, ukada kushandisa yavanoti Tuwita, Fesibhuku,

Watsiapu kana zvimwewo, zviri kwauri.

Aiva madziva ava mazambuko, veposvo vakasiiwa vakatemba,

Rasvika zvaro dandemutande.

Newewo ukapusa unosara, fambirana nenguva machewe.

Mumabasa mazhinji mave kudiwa vane ruzivo rwedandemutande.

Iwe chirega kurwisana nechinokurira!

Tsvagawo ruzivo rwedandemutande ugamuchirike pane vamwe.

PHOTOGRAPH BY DERICK ANIES

Florence Tinevimbo Mungure akaberekwa kumhuri yekwaUreke inobva kuBuhera

ndokuzowanikwa kwaMutare. Akaberekerwa munzvimbo yeKwekwe ndokukuriramo.

Mushure mekupedza zvidzidzo zvake paUniversity of Zimbabwe mugore ra2003,

Florence akatanga kudzidzisa pachikoro cheWaddilove ndokuzoenda paMazowe High

School muna 2005, kunove ndiko kwaachiri panguva ino. Ndiye umwe wevanyori vaviri

vakanyora bhuku rinoshandiswa nevana vesekondari padanho rekutanga, rinonzi Gona

ChiShona. Anofarira kunyora maererano nezvinhu zvinenge zvichiitika mukugarisana

kwevanhu, nechinangwa chekufumura zvakaipa, uyewo kutsiura vanotsaudzira. Kunze

kwekunyora, Florence anopepetawo zvinyorwa zvevamwe vanyori pamwe nekudzidzisa

ChiShona kuvashanyi kana vashandi vanenge vabva kune dzimwe nyika. Anoitawo

zvakare basa rekushandura zvinyorwa zviri muchirungu achiisa mururimi rwaamai,

kana kubvisa muChiShona achiisa muChirungu.

SHONA

CHILDREN'S

STORY

1. "Chimbira Chakashawiwa Muswe" Sophia Wekwete

Chimbira

Chakashaiwa

Muswe

SOPHIA WEKWETE

Kare kare paiva navamwe mbuya vainzi Mbuya Chimuti. Vakanga vachembera.

Vaitofamba nomudonzvo. Vaigara navana vavo navazukuru muguta raVaChikomo.

Vakanga vongogona kurima nzungu nokuti meso akanga achemberavo. Asi nzungu

vaigona kuzadza dura ravo. Dura rakanga rakaisirwa hwikwiyo, kunama napamusoro

kuti mvura isapinda. Raiva nechimuromo chidoko chinokwana mwana mudoko kupinda

napo. Vaidana muzukuru kuvatorera nzungu kana vachida kuita dovi.

Rimwe zuva vakadana vazukuru vose, ivo ndokuuya ndokugara pamumvuri womutondo

waiva paimba yavo. Vakabvisa zeteko pamuromo wedura ndokudana muzukuru

Handina kuti apinde mudura. Wainokora nzugu nechitswanda achipa mbuya vachiisa

mudengu. Rakazara kuti paa. Handinda ndokubuda hake.

Vakati kuvazukuru vavo ndonoda kuti mundimenyere nzungu dzangu ndigokupai

manyangamuromo. Uye ndichakudzidzisai rungano rwatichaimba tose. Vazukuru

vakavuchira mavoko vachifarira. Vakatanga kumenya nzungu mbuya vachiimba vachiti:

"Chimbira chakashaiwa muswe

Nenzira yokutumidzira

Chimbira chakashaiwa muswe

Nenzira yokutumidzira "

Vakazoti ngatichiimba tose. Neni ndinodzana ndakabata mudonzvo wangu. Vakatanga

kuimba vachidzana rwiyo rwavanga vadzidziswa nambuya. Vakapedza kumenya

nzungu vachifara chose.

Vakazoti vapedza kuimba, mbuya ndokuvapa shandiro yenzungu. Vakati umwe

noumwe ngaauye novuswa hwakaoma. Vakuru tobvura nzungu, vadoko vachiimba

vachidzana.

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Mbuya vakawadza huswa ndokudira nzungu pamusoro, ndokuwadza huswa zve

pamusoro penzungu, ndokutungidza mwoto. Vakaramba vachikurunga mwoto norumuti

kusvika dzaibva.

Mbuya ndokuzoti, “Chiitai dendenedzu panzungu. Chidyai. Ndiwo

manyangamuromo enyu.”

Vazukuru vakadya kusvikira vaguta vose. Mbuya vakati “Chinongai dzasara muchiisa

muhomwe dzenyu mugondopavo vana mai. Mononga muchiimba rwiyo rwedu:

"Chimbira chakashaiwa muswe

Nenzira yokutumidzira

Chimbira chakashaiwa muswe

Nenzira yokutumidzira "

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ILLUSTRATIONS BY KNSTARTSTUDIO, arranged by BRANDON PFUNDER

45

Vazukuru vakainda kudzimba dzavo vachingoimba. Vana mai vanokuya zviyo paguyo

vakadzidzirawo rwiyo vakatanga kuimbawo. Vaiimbazve vachitswa mhunga. Vazukuru

vakafara chose kuti vanga vadzidzisawo rwiyo rwaMbuya kunaana mai vavo.

Ndipo pakaperera sarungano.

Mbuya Sophia Wekwete vanga vari mudzidzisi vemakore akawanda. Vakafundira kuita

mudzidzisi weDomestic Science KuMorgenster Mission kuMasvingo. Vakadzidzisa

muzvikoro zvakawanda mudunhu rokwaGutu. Mbuya Wekwete vanga vakadzidzira

zvakare, Braille, yavakadzidzisa kwechinguva paCopota School for the Blind. Pamusoro

peizvi vanga vari munhu akabata nemadzimai amasangano akawanda, vachivadzidzisa

kubika, kuruka, kusona, nekuumba hari. Mbuya Wekwete vaifarira kuimba vari muchoir

vachitungamirira madzimai eRuwadzano nebato revarwi muReformed Church.

Pamusoro pezvese izvi, Mbuya Wekwete vaifarira kunyora. Vakanyora dzimwe ngano

dzakatsikiswa nedzimwe zvinji dzavakasiira mhuri yavo. Mbuya Wekwete vakashaika

mugore ra2019, vakasiya vana navazukuru vanoramba vachinakidzwa nengano dzavo.

ENGLISH

CHILDREN'S

STORY

1. "The Sock In The Painting" Vanessa Hounsell

The Sock In

The Painting

VANESSA HOUNSELL

Lucy woke up with a start. ‘Something was happening today? What was it?’

The smell of toast, and freshly cut pear, drifted up from the kitchen below and she could see

two small, ruffled birds sitting in the Magnolia tree outside her window, chattering furtively

to one another.

‘Lucy!’ her mum called from downstairs. ‘Are you up for breakfast yet?’

‘Not quite yet, mum,’ Lucy called down. ‘Hmmmm,’ she thought, and thought. ‘What is it

about today that I have completely forgotten?’ This thought was now starting to spin around

in her head, making her feel a little dizzy.

She glanced out at the birds again, but a very large beetle sitting on her window ledge

intercepted her view. It was staring at her, and it too seemed to be frowning at her, in a cross

kind of way, as though asking why she was being so remiss.

‘L-U-C-Y!!!!’ her mother’s voice was now sounding urgent. ‘Are you coming down to

breakfast?’

There it was again. THE THING. THE THING that they had to do today that she couldn’t even

begin to remember.

ILLUSTRATIONS BY SOLMARIART, arranged by BRANDON PFUNDER

Lucy tore off her duvet, grabbed her flannel dressing gown and fled out of her bedroom

down the stairs. She was so convinced that THE THING was following her, that she ran

around the kitchen table twice before landing on her favourite chair and turning to face the

door…Luckily THE THING was not there.

Lucy’s mother had spun around in turmoil as Lucy tore into the room. ‘What is going on

Lucy?’ she asked, completely forgetting the frying pan in her hand which was spitting hot oil

in every direction.

‘Oh, nothing, mum,’ Lucy muttered apologetically. ‘Just my usual burst of morning energy.’

A soft piece of hair had floated up from her mother’s forehead and was standing nearly dead

straight up, staring at the ceiling.

Lucy could feel the presence of THE THING in the kitchen. It was everywhere. ‘WHAT IS

IT THAT WE ARE MEANT TO BE DOING TODAY?’ was buzzing around, and around, in her

head again. She jumped up, nearly knocking her chair over and fled upstairs to her room

to change, only to be met by the vexed beetle, angry sky, and furtively chatting birds, all

nodding their heads in unison.

‘Lucy! We have to go,’ her mother’s voice drifted up again. ‘Coming, mum,’ she called down,

and without a backward glance, Lucy double-timed down the stairs and tumbled into the

hallway. Her mother’s upright strand of hair met Lucy’s drift and wafted down from the sky

to meet her forehead.

‘Well, let’s go love,’ was all she said and pulled the heavy front door open. They stepped out

together towards the grumpy sky. ‘It will only take ten minutes to get there,’ her mum said.

‘Mrs. Lewis, your art teacher at school gave me the directions…’

Lucy froze. Her art teacher? Her mind started to swirl madly again, thoughts rushing in one

after the other. They were starting to fight each other in her head.

Mrs. Lewis…her art teacher…the painting…the sock in the painting! THE SOCK IN THE

PAINTING!!!

THE THING seemed to be suffocating her as it all came flooding back to her. Mrs. Lewis

telling her mother that Lucy was a little ‘hyperactive’ in the classroom. That Lucy LACKED

focus. That Lucy LACKED concentration. That Lucy seemed to STRUGGLE with ability.

She told Lucy’s mother that she was concerned that ‘Lucy was putting unnecessary, and

rather odd elements, into her paintings at school.’ ‘Lucy drew a sock in the middle of her

most recent painting of leaves and flowers, Mrs. Singer,’ she told Lucy’s mother.

Lucy’s mum then told Mrs. Lewis that if it would make Mrs. Lewis ‘happier’, she would take

Lucy to visit the specialist art teacher, called an art therapist, to get a second opinion.

Lucy’s mother didn’t say ‘goodbye’ as she usually did, but ‘good day,’ in a very formal way.

Lucy remembers her mother’s heels click-clacking sharply down the passageway as they left.

That had all happened on Tuesday, and today was Saturday. In between those days, THE

THING had disappeared into a black hole somewhere in Lucy’s mind. Now it was back.

‘Your art portfolio is on the back seat, darling,’ said her mother casually. I brought it along

to show Anne-Marie. ‘Anne-Marie?’ thought Lucy. Her name sounded so different from

Mrs. Lewis. It had a certain roundness to it, like walnuts or butter. THE THING immediately

backed into the back of the car, shuffled into a corner forlornly and thankfully, stayed there

for now.

‘And so…. What is an art therapist then?’ asked Lucy, feeling a little bolder now that THE

THING seemed to have semi- fallen asleep in the back corner of the car.

Lucy’s mother paused for a while and then answered, ‘An art therapist is someone who helps

talented people like you with their art.’

Very shortly they pulled up outside a pretty house and Lucy’s mum reached over to pick up

Lucy’s art portfolio, her arm nearly bumping into THE THING at the same time. ‘Come on

darling,’ she said brightly. ‘Let’s go and meet Anne-Marie.’ Immediately Lucy thought of

butter and walnuts, and THE THING shrank even further back into the back of the car seat,

although it did get up slowly, shuffle out the door and begin to follow them at a cautious

distance.

The front door of the pretty house opened, and

there was a lady standing there.

‘Hello, you must be Anne-Marie?’ asked Lucy’s

mum. The lady standing there smiled at them. Lucy

looked at her and she looked back at Lucy. Lucy felt a little

as though she liked her immediately.

‘Hello,’ said Anne-Marie softly. ‘Yes, that’s me, please come

inside.’ Her voice reminded Lucy of softly flowing water, with little ripples every now and

again.

As Lucy and her mother entered in through the door, out of the corner of her eye Lucy saw

THE THING slink in behind them furtively.

‘Well, hello Lucy and, is it Maggie?’ asked Anne-Marie. ‘It’s wonderful to have you here.’

Lucy looked around the room which looked to her like some kind of studio. There was art

equipment everywhere and a huge dog curled up on the mat.

Anne-Marie casually walked over to one of the many trestle tables and sat down on a threelegged

stool. ‘Come and sit with me,’ she said. Lucy and her mum followed her to the table.

‘Right, Lucy, let’s get started,’ said Anne-Marie. ‘Will you show me your art portfolio please?’

Lucy felt a moment of blind panic. THE THING suddenly reappeared next to her and shuffled

confidently around the table towards Anne-Marie, who couldn’t see it of course. The words,

‘LACKED!’..and ‘STRUGGLED’ and ‘GET RID OF...’ began circling agitatedly around in Lucy’s

mind.

‘Uhm,’ Lucy started….

‘Let’s go through it together,’ suggested Anne-Marie. She leaned out and opened the first

page of Lucy’s portfolio…THE THING was looming ominously closer…but then, Anne-

Marie’s face burst into all kinds of smiles, and she laughed delightedly. ‘Wow, Lucy what a

wonderful set of drawings!’ she said.

Lucy felt as though her chest was going to burst with excitement. She couldn’t believe what

she was hearing. And then the strangest thing began to happen…first THE THING shrank

back into the corner of the room, and then each page that Anne-Marie looked and wondered

at, THE THING shrank smaller and smaller and smaller until it completely disappeared, in a

small puff of smoke, altogether.

‘And tell me about this one – it looks like you have drawn a sock in the middle of the

painting?’ smiled Anne-Marie.

‘Well, my mum took us to a sock puppet show and one of the talking, sock puppets was a tree

with leaves,’ said Lucy. ‘The talking tree sock puppet person made me laugh so much that I

thought it would be great to get him or her to visit my printed leaves picture!!’

Then Lucy’s mother started to laugh, and the more her mother laughed, the more

Anne-Marie laughed, and the more Lucy laughed.

They laughed and laughed and laughed.

Then Ann-Marie said, ‘I want you to paint whatever it is you would like to paint today.’ So,

Lucy painted and painted until it was time to go home. Then she and her mum thanked

Anne-Marie and said that they would visit again soon.

Lucy’s mum hummed happily all the way home and when they arrived Lucy skipped upstairs

to tell her imaginary friends all about what had happened that special day. When she walked

into her room the little beetle did a few happy turns, the small, brown birds chirped sweetly

at her, and the big old grumpy sky opened, and a beautiful soft finger of sunlight stole out

from the clouds and touched her arm.

She had seldom felt happier.

Vanessa Hounsell was born in Cape Town, RSA. She attended the University of Cape

Town, majoring in English Literature and Economic History. Having graduated, she was

offered the position of Commodities Correspondent for The Public Ledger/Commodity

Week (UK). This was followed by various editorial positions in publishing, including

Cassell plc (She worked on the Brewer’s Phrase and Fable list), Butterworths-Tolley, The

Antiques Trade Gazette, amongst others. Following her move to reside in Zimbabwe in

2004, she took up writing regular features for magazines such as Zimartist and Ndeipi,

and has published work in The Literary Hatchett (USA) and Writers’ Space Africa.

NDEBELE

POETRY

1. "Wembethe"

2. "Bulawayo Nombali"

Ngingu Qinisela Possenti Ndlovu

Oka Nkoma

PHOTOGRAPH BY HEATHER CONYERS STUDIO

Wembethe

NGINGU QINISELA POSSENTI NDLOVU

Wembethe, hatsh’ ingubo kumb’ izigqoko

Ugqok’ uthando, ubuntu, ubuqotho

Wembethe, hatsh’ ubuhlalu, indadatho, idikazi

Ugqok’ isihe, isihawu, isimilo

Wembethe, hatsh’ isigogo, ixaba iyembe, ibhulugwe, isigqoko, iqhiye

Ugqok’ isithunzi, ubukhona, ubuzwe.

Ukugqok’ ayisikh’ ukuval’ubuqunu, ubuze

Yinkwembes’ isiqu somuntu ingaphakathi yomuntu

Ukugqok’ akutsh’ ukugelezis’ amanzi ukuhlanzeka ngaphandle, ukugcob amafutha

Ukugqoka lokuhlanzeka yikusondel’ ebantwini

Yikuba lobudlelwano labantu

Yikwaz’ abantu

Yikuzwisisana, yikwazisana, yikunakelelana

Yikuzihlupha ngabantu.

Singaxega, sichothoze, sihlokoz’umunt’ ‘ongaphandle, kodw’ insikayomuntu

ngowangaphakathi

Unembeza, ingane yokuzikhuza, yokuzihlosisa

Umntwan’ ozibuthayo, ozibambayo

Owangaphandle ngamehlo lendlebe

Uyabona, alalele isimo

Ingqondo, imizwa, ukholo ngumuntu wangaphakathi

Isalukazi sibala intungo zomuzi ngenhliziyo, hatshi ngenombolo

Lixheg’ elaz’ ukuthi kusasa kuyizolonguy’ usekaNhloniphani lonaMpilwende

Kabawel’ inkanda,

Wembeth’ okugqokiweyo.

Ngingu Qinisela Possenti Ndlovu ngazalwa eTsholotsho Ko Mabhanda lapha

khona ubaba owayengumbalazi khona umama engumongikazi esibhedlela

sase Nyamandlovu ngo Zibandlela 28 1970. Ngimfana wesibili umulini

yamabafana abathathu. Ngakhuliswa ebandleni lase Khatalolika, IRoma

ngabaphathizwa ngilusane ngaphiwa ibizo lomunye umFundisi okwakuthiwa

ngu Father Possenti owase Regina Mundi. Ngafunda imfundo yami yaphansi

eSt Patricks School Emakhokhoba ngihlala emuzini wase Mzilikazi. Ngaya

eSobukhazi Secondary uform 1 and 2, ngenza uForm Four eChristian Brothers

College ngaqubeka ngaya Mzilikazi High ukwenza uForm 6. Ngafunda

eBulawayo Poly engenza icourse khona ngenza izifundo eZimbabwe Open

University and National University of Science and Technology. Ngithethe,

ngihlala emuzini wase Trenance ngingena ibandla lase Khatolika iRoma.

Ngisebenza e Bulawayo Poly njengombalisi okwakathesi.

BULAWAYO

NOMBALI

OKA NKOMA

Bayethe Bulawayo sigodlo sembali!

Ziko lembali yamakhosi lamakhosikazi

Koluqandayo bathe tu wen’

uyabakhulumela!

Eyab’ izitshiwe wen’ uyabahlabelela

Ngwalongwalo wen’ ongela siphetho

Ufihl’ eyesabekay’ imbali yeminyakakazi

Ufukamel’ ezigcwal’ izingwalokaz’ izindaba.

Imizi yakh’ ichayile yenaba Bulawayo

Yendlale yonk’ imbali kaMthwakazi

dandalazi

Imizi yakh’ ithe wathalala yendlaleka laz’

izindabandaba

Izikolo zakho zijamile zipheth’ olukhulu

Izitalada zakho zintantalaza zisiya le lale

Kazi zithule laz’ izindaba lezindabakazi.

Mfulamful’ ongatshiyo, oTshangane

besitsha

Sizib’ esingatshiyiy’ ezinye zisitsha

Mthombokaz’ ongomiyo, eminy’ isoma qha!

Sigcawukaz’ esiphuphum’ imiland’

eyesabekayo.

Walob’ uLobhengula kwangaziwa laph’

akhona

Wena wayiloba wayilond’ imbali

kamfokaMatshobana

Ngaw' umuz’ omkhulu weLobhengula

Las’ isitalad’ uLobhengula sitsholobela

sisiyakhonale laph’eyanyamalal' isiyakhon’

ingqungqul’ emadol’ abomvu

Lezikolo lazo ziloba ngay’ owamaWaba.

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UNkulumane lay’ akwaziwa laph’ ayakhona

Wen’ uyamkhulumela ngaw’ umuzi

waseNkulumane

Ibizo lomntwana lohlal’ emikhumbulweni

yezizukulwana

Ngazi izikol’ ezibik’ enkul’ indaba yethol’

elabhongel’ inkunz’ enkuluyahwaqabala

PHOTOGRAPHY BY ARTUSH

kwaba yikunyamala kwalo

Uyichayile wayenek’ indaba

yomfokaKhumalo yon’

eyinsindabaphenduli.

Uzilalel’ uMzilikaz’ obamathong' eMatojeni

Umuz’ omkhulu weMzilikaz’ uyilondolozil’

imbali

Imbali yeqhaw’elikhul’ eladabul’

uMthwakazi

Laz’ izikolo zemfundo ziyifumbeth’

ekaMzacomnyamo otshayamadoda

Elel’ ezithulele tu lezi zindawo ziyatsho

ngaye

Izizukulwana lezizukulwana zizamazi

ngazo.

Amadodana’ amakhosi law’ awaze

wawakhohlwa

Uwabeke dandalazi kuzulu wonk’ abonakala

Nansiyan’ imiz’ oNjube laboNguboyenja

bebik’ emkhul’ imilando

Yon’ eyamakhosana, amadodan’ esil’ esal’

ukufuywa ngabafokazi

Atshabalal’ okwemvelo, kodwa amabiz’ awo

ami nini lanini

Alotshiw' abukezwa kuz' izigcawu lezi.

Izindlovukazi laz’ uzihloniphile Bulawayo

Nansiya isikol' iLozikeyi sifakaza

ngendlovukazi yakho

Kant’ umuzi weTshabalala law’ uyatsho

ngokaTshabalala

Indlovukaz’ eyancelis’ uLobhengula

wamaWaba

Lanxa watshabalal’ umthanyelo kaMwaka

Eyakh’ imbali kayitshabalalang’

itshwathikiw' eTshabalala

Zizatshabalal’ izizukulwana ziyitshiy’ ithe

kla!

Kawuwalibalang' amaqhawe kaMthwakaz’

abambisana lamakhosi

UMncumbatha owancumbath’ amakhosi

simazi ngas’ isikolo seMncumbatha

UMkhithika owakhithiz' amadod’

umbukezile ngas’ eseMkhithika

yaseCowdray Park

ULotsheowalotsh’ izith’ umlobil’ esikol’

eMakhokhoba

UMasuk’ owasukel’ isizwe wasidungadunga

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lay’ umvezile ngesikol’ eNtumbane

Wonke la ngamaqhaw’ aqhaqhazelis’ abafo

bayafela kude le!

Uwalobile wawacomba ngezikolo zemfundo

lapha lalaphaya

Ubahloniphile wabaphakamisa ngaw’

amabiz’ ezikolo.

Imiz’ amaxhiba lezigodlo zikaMthwakazi

ukugodlile Bulawayo.

Nansiya iGibixhegu laph' amaxheg’ akwejisa

khona

Behla ngomphimbo bezihlabelela

ngesigodlo sikaMzilawegazi

Nansiya iMhlahlandlel’ isigodlo samawofisi

Iyahlokom’ ihlahlel’ imbali yesigodlo

senkos' uLobengula

Kayihlal’ injal’ ihlahlelwa leyondaba

Amabuth’ ayezal' amaqhawe law'

uwabuthile Bulawayo

Isikolo iNduba sisibikela ngebutho leqhawe

uLotshe

Lon’ eladuba ladung’ izizwe zabafo zasala

zididekile.

Isikol’ iMabhukudwana laso simbokoth’

okukhulu

Yon’ imbali yamadod’abhokod’ amadoda

ngemidikadika

AmaNdwandw’ adweba ngemikhonto

phansi kwavulek’ imifula

Nansiya siwenek’ isikolo semfundo

yaphezulu.

Singabathin’ oMagwegwe laboMakhandeni?

Ukugxila kibo kugwegw’ ezimathons'

izinyembezi

OGwabalanda singelandise ngabo sigeq’

amagula

OPhumula, Phelandaba, Mganwini

laboNketa;Labo bathule babik’ ezab’

ezingapheliyo.

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Labemzini Bulawayo bezile wabamukela

Ikhon’ imigwaq’ oCecil, Leander laboMoffat

Yon’ ebik’ indaba yaboNdukuzibomvu

Bon' abangena bagamanxa kuMthwakazi

Imiz’ oQueens Park, Parklands

laboKingsdale

Lay’ ibik’ indaba yab’ abemzini

Won' amadod' angelamadolo,

ondlebezikhanyilanga

OMilton, Evelyn, Coghlan laboTownsend

Yizigcawu zemfund’ ezikhumbuz’ uzulu

Zimkhumbuza ngabamhloph’ abacand’

imfundo

Ulugwal’ olungebalwe luphutshwe

Uyindab’ engelandisw’ iphutsh.

Uyisiphal’ esiphuphumay’ esingapheliyo

Uyisihlahl’ esithela njalo nje

Abalandisi bazalandisa batsh’ amazwi

Bezam’ ukulandisa ngawe Bulawayo

Kanti wen’ eyakh’ imbal’ uyichayile

dandalazi!

Phila phakade Bulawayo Nombali

Landis’ ulandisel’ izizwe lezizwekazi

Fumbath’ ufukamel’ imbali

yeminyakanyaka

Nom’ uthule, fakaza kwaziwe kuzwakale

kude!

Oka Nkomo uzelwe ngo1976 eGrants

eDete. Uqale ukufunda koNguwanyana

Primary ePlumtree ngo1984. Esuka lapho

wayaqedisa imfundo yaphansi eJabatshaba,

eLupane. Imfundo yesekhondari uyifunde

ezikolo ezigoqela iJotsholo, Fatima

leHamilton High. Ngo2001 uqeqetshe

ezifundweni zobubalisi eHillside Teachers'

College. Ubuye wenza njalo izifundo

zemfundo yaphezulu eMidlands State

University lapho aqeqetshe khona

ngo2012. Ngokomsebenzi useke wafundisa

ezikolo ezibalisela iSinqobile Primary,

Somankonyane Secondary leFounders High.

Okwamanje ufundisa isiNdebele eBulawayo

Adventist High School. Uthethe okaNkomo

intombi yakoMafu balabantwana abababili.

Useke waloba izinkondlo eziphume kuqoqo

elithi Izinkondlo Ezinhlobonhlobo, lezingwalo

zabafundi Inkanyezi Yolwazi 2, 3 lo4.

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ART

WORK

1. "COVID-19: Slowly Burying the World"

2. "COVID-19: Irreversible Damage"

Simbarashe Tangai

Simbarashe Tangai

Born in 1993, Simbarashe Tangai is a Zimbabwean artist, currently based in his

hometown, Gweru. He specialises in color pencil and ballpoint pen art.

Entirely self taught, Simba has been drawing since he was six.He studied Medicine

and Surgery at the University of Zimbabwe from 2012, but quit his career as a doctor

in 2018 to become a full time professional artist. He has been honing his skills since

then.

In his artwork, Simba accurately and realistically portrays the beauty of the animate

world by blending his drawing skills with his understanding of anatomy. Simba also

seeks to spread awareness messages about the preservation of health and wellbeing,

and the conservation of the natural world.

Currently, Simba is working on The Art Of Health competition where his artwork was

selected into the TOP 12 finalists.

COVID-19: Slowly Burying the World

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FEATURED

POET

Tanaka Chidora

Because Sadness

is Beautiful?

In Conversation With TANAKA CHIDORA

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WOUNDS

I curate my best wounds into poetry

and leave the worst ones as salt lines on the cheeks;

so, we can safely say both the best and the worst

leave monuments behind:

syntactic lines for lips to kiss at every syllable

and salt lines for those who receive thrills

from gazing at lacerations left on withered cheeks.

TM: Tendai Machingaidze

TC: Tanaka Chidora

some good, some sad, until the city

happened many years later.

TM: Tell us about yourself - where you

grew up, your family, where you studied,

where you are now?

TC: I was born in the 80s when the

euphoria for Zimbabwe’s independence

was still enough to offset any lingering

visions of dystopia. But the memories I

have are really of the 90s – the village

in Masvingo; a brief stint in Chinhoyi’s

Chikonohono; then another brief stint in

some grass-thatched huts that huddled at

the outskirts of Chinhoyi (looking back,

I am sure they constituted a squatter

camp); then the village which, for many

years, became the only place I knew until a

kind aunt whisked me to the city because,

according to her, there were better schools

there.

The village has a lot of fond memories,

including Grandmother whom we buried

last year. She appears on the cover photo

of my poetry collection, Because Sadness

is Beautiful? I will talk about this photo

later. I also remember Mudhara Matanya

whose voice I usually use in my Shona

poems which I am writing in what I think

is pure Karanga (ChiVhitori). I remember

the names too: Mudhara Dambu (my

no-nonsense uncle who is late now),

Mudhara Rori, Mudhara Maths, Mudhara

Ngipongipo, Mbuya VaChikara (my paternal

grandmother whose Hwisiri hymns were

usually sung while hoeing her groundnut

patch), Mbuya Mai Shabanie (I need to ask

my uncles where that name came from)…

Hell, my own father was/is nicknamed Jeke.

His namesake was/is nicknamed Chigubhu.

I am sure the nicknames had to do with

the notorious village brew which Mbuya

VaMaganga (may she rest in peace) brewed

with a skill that defied her notorious

short-sightedness. I remember the fights

while herding cattle, the interminable

hunger that gnawed at my insides because

Mother would have locked all her doors as

punishment for my refusal to go to church.

I remember many things that happened,

The city is actually Magaba Hostels in

Mbare which, in my first novel for which

I am the agent and still hunting for a

publisher, appears as Magamba Hostels

(the pun is really unintended). This too has

its memories, like that time when I visited

an aunt who lived North of Samora and I

didn’t know what to do with a clean toilet

because in Magaba no one really worried

about those things. In the morning, I would

commute (and sometimes walk) to school

in Mt Pleasant and come back to Magaba in

the evening. It was like a tale of two cities.

I became the butt of many jokes at school

because of my Masvingo accent and the fact

that I lived in Magaba.

I stayed in Magaba until I got married and

later received my MA in Literature from the

University of Zimbabwe. I later acquired

my PhD in Literature from the University

of the Free State, South Africa. Since 2014,

I have been teaching Popular Culture and

Literature, and Theories of Literature, at

the University of Zimbabwe. I aslo taught

Creative Writing after the publication of

my first poetry collection. Additionally, I

had a brief, semester-long stint at Goethe

University, Germany, where I taught

Afrodiasporic Writing in English. I am now

in the process of calling time on my career

at the University of Zimbabwe and moving

to MSU where I will be involved in a lot of

research work at their Language Institute.

TM: Why poetry? Please tell us about your

writing journey – where you began, your

inspiration, where you are now. What

authors have influenced your writing?

TC: Poetry came to me. Besides the fact

that I, at one time, spent a whole weekend

with David Mungoshi, Memory Chirere,

Ignatius Mabasa, Philani Nyoni and Mercy

Dhliwayo who all inspired me to write, I

want to say poetry, as you see it in Because

Sadness is Beautiful? actually came to me

when I desperately needed it.

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Before that weekend with the poets

mentioned above, I had, for a long

time, immersed myself in the following

collections: Cemetery of Mind (Dambudzo

Marechera), Blind Moon (Chenjerai Hove),

Kingfisher, Jikinya and other Poems

(Musaemura Zimunya - I especially like the

poem ‘Jikinya’; it’s a masterpiece), Bhuku

Risina Basa (Memory Chirere), Live Like an

Artist (David Mungoshi), The People Look

like Flowers at Last (Charles Bukowski),

Rhyme and Resistance (Onai Mushava), and

Philtrum (Philani Nyoni). In the course of

my studies, I had, of course, read lots of

poems, but the list above represents those

collections that left an indelible mark on

the surface of my creativity. Later on, I

subscribed to Rattle Magazine which is

in the habit of sending all these beautiful

poems to my mailbox. Those too have

shaped my view of poetry and how I go

about my craft.

But, like I said, poetry came to me when I

desperately needed it, especially towards

the end of 2018 when I first experienced

what it meant to be depressed. I am saying

this for the first time. At first, I said to

myself, look, you graduated with a PhD this

year. You have been working hard for three

years and suddenly, you find yourself with

nothing to do, with no research to wake up

to in the middle of the night. That is why

you are depressed, hello! But when things

got worse, when I started breaking down

and crying in other people’s inboxes in the

middle of the night (a few of my friends

remember these crying bouts – they

happened faithfully for many months), I

knew I had to do something about it.

Depression is not something we really talk

about in Zimbabwe. I mean, why would a

Zimbabwean suffer from such a disease?

Are you fighting with your wife? No. Are

you unemployed? No. Are you broke? No.

Are you taking illegal drugs? No. Why the

hell are you depressed then? In a country

like ours, it’s really difficult to find a way

out of depression. So, I found myself

writing poetry. And I had to title the

collection, Because Sadness is Beautiful?

This was me trying to transform this very

desolate and lonely space into something

that people could read and respond to with

likes and all those happy emojis.

My depression had affected my progress

with my novel, Magamba Hostels, so poetry

offered something more immediate for

my urgent need. Later on, I figured that,

maybe I could, since I had done a lot of

advance publicity for my unfinished novel,

use the collection as a trailer to the novel.

So, you will find that there are two poems

dedicated to Magamba Hostels (the novel

and its subject matter) and Magamba

Hostels (the place) in the collection. What

I was trying to do was give my readers

something to gnaw at while I finished

my novel in peace (the peace is relative

of course, you know, living Zimbabwean

in current times). Eighteen months after

the compilation of Because Sadness is

Beautiful? my novel was complete. It has

been reviewed by a couple of reviewers

who have encouraged me to go on and

publish it. In fact, one of the reviewers

said that he wouldn’t be worried, even

for a minute, if I published the novel in

its current form, word for word. So that’s

some really positive stuff there.

I have also published a single short

story, ‘Days of the Sun’, in Chitungwiza

Mushamukuru: An anthology from

Zimbabwe’s biggest ghetto town. It’s set in

Chitungwiza (as are all subsequent short

stories) where I currently reside. The short

story combines prose and poetry and has

two temporal settings – the past and the

present. I also have a couple of poems in

Zimbolicious (2020) and Best New African

Poets (2019).

TM: Your debut poetry book is titled

“Because Sadness is Beautiful?” Why did

you choose this title? What is your vision

behind the collection of poems? Is there a

special meaning behind the book cover?

TC: Like I said, the poems in that

collection were written during that period

when I desperately wanted to hold on to

something. So, you will see that even where

I am talking about my country, there is

something perceptibly personal about it.

When my publisher read the collection for

the first time, he said, look, these poems

can behave the way you want your poems to

behave if arranged well. They can become

a narrative. And yes, when I rearranged

them, there was the narrative – depression,

Zimbabwe, Magamba, Grandmother,

Mother, Father, death, love, broken hearts

and all: everything arranged in such a way

that words gave form to ME.

The title of the collection is something

that developed later after I had written

many of the poems that now appear in the

collection. Initially, I had titled it The Dying

City, but after realising that I was in each

poem, either as a spectator or persona, I

decided to find a title that was closer to

where I was. I then held a Facebook poll

with my readers and Because Sadness is

Beautiful? was endorsed.

There is also this poem, ‘The Bee Sting in

the Eye’ by Valvis. That poem made me

think about how a lot of terrible beauty

is born out of very sad moments. It was

also at that time that I wrote the piece,

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‘Creativity in Desolation’ on my blog. So,

yea, the odds were really against The Dying

City as a title of this collection.

The title, as you might have seen, is a

question which I am not in any way trying

to answer. One reviewer complained about

this, but I think poetry should, through

its terrible beauty, show, then the reader

figures out what’s going on without being

guided by the dictatorship of the author.

My depression was not beautiful. But

poetry, even when inspired by sadness, is

damn beautiful.

Now, as to the picture on the cover...It’s

one of those pictures from way back that

suddenly re-appears in your life after

many decades, after you have done a lot of

photoshopping and editing of pictures and

posting them on social media to tell stories

that are correct, too correct. Suddenly,

something raw, something that inspires

raw, unedited emotion appears and you fall

in love with it because of the sentimental

value it has, because Grandmother (who,

having succumbed to interminable

amnesia, no longer remembers you, and

dies a year later) is there in the picture,

because you remember the day the picture

was taken by some visitors who had come

from the city with their city smell and

bread and Vaseline (you were in Grade 3

and wearing your only sensible clothes

which doubled as your school uniform),

because you realise many years later that

the things you miss about the past are

not all rosy. The picture is some kind of

distillation of everything that has led to

this present moment, and you realise it’s

not something that has to be explained in a

very sensible way with all the coordinates

in place. So, the title of your collection

becomes a question, Because Sadness is

Beautiful?

The picture also came to be my cover

because my publisher wanted something

personal since most of the poems lead

back to me. I had unsuccessfully surfed

the internet for an image that was both sad

and beautiful when my publisher called

and asked, do you have a picture from way

back? That was when it dawned on me that

the photograph that Mbuya Mai Valentine

had unearthed during the Easter holidays

of 2018 was the perfect thing.

TM: You work at the University of

Zimbabwe. What courses do you teach?

How do you go about shaping the voices

of upcoming writers and literary critics?

With the economic struggles of our

country, and in turn the degradation of

the book industry, what are the future

prospects of those studying literature and

creative writing in Zimbabwe?

TC: For six years, I taught Theories of

Literature; and Popular Culture and

Literature. Those never changed. More

courses were added here and there

depending on the available staff. These

include African Literature; Literature

and Social Movements; and, later on

after the publication of my poetry

collection, Creative Writing. Because of

this experience and the exposure it has

brought, I have worked with many writers

as an editor and book reviewer (first, for

The Herald, Newsday, Southern Times,

and, later, for my blog: www.litmindssite.

wordpress.com). I have also worked with

arts organisations like The National Arts

Council of Zimbabwe (NACZ) and so on.

On a normal day, I encounter many poems

that are hurriedly posted into my Whatsapp

or Facebook inboxes by enthusiastic

writers (some of them, to be honest, are

a tasteless bouquet). At first, I used to

indulge all and sundry, until the clutter of

work made that impossible. These days I

ask the question: how do you know me?

Usually, the answer is: I have read about

you in the newspaper and I know you

have a collection titled Because Sadness is

Beautiful? (sometimes I am told that the

title is Sadness is Beautiful). Have you read

the collection? I ask. No, I haven’t (I usually

bluetick the last response and move on

with my cluttered life. I mean, if you don’t

want to read my published work, how do

you expect me to read your unpublished

writing for free?).

But, I have also seen young poets whose

reading habits are very encouraging, not

just because they have read my collection

(it’s a bonus if they have), but also because

we can actually have a mind-stretching

conversation during which they throw

in all these wonderful titles they would

have read. I am talking about young poets

like Tafadzwa Chiwanza whose No Bird

is Singing Now? is deeply philosophical,

beautiful and too sad for a poet of his

age...lol! I don’t know if the question mark

at the end of his title is a product of my

influence, hahahahaha! But I am sure I have

influenced many young poets.

I belong to various Whatsapp groups where

many of them are being nurtured. I single

out the Gourd of Consciousness group

(led by Khumbulani Muleya) which has

given many young poets a taste of what

it means to be published in a national

newspaper and popular online magazines,

and to appear on radio to talk about their

work. I have also made some of my poems

accessible by occasionally posting them

on Facebook with accompanying images

for effect. I am glad to say that I have

responded to calls by some excited readers

to wean myself from social media coyness

and really be out there. Since then, I have

come across many people who have told me

that they are inspired by what I am doing

on social media. That is really encouraging.

Occasionally, I have also given Zoom

readings like at Off the Wall Poetry, a very

vibrant South African-based poetry club.

The idea is to be heard as much as possible

and hopefully help another enthusiastic

and upcoming poet one way or the other.

As for the reading/writing climate in

Zimbabwe, I belong to various book clubs

and writing groups. The enthusiasm

is there; what is lacking is the support

network. An author has to do everything

from writing to marketing, and I do not

think such a scenario is sustainable. Many

of our writers really get acknowledged

locally when they publish and become

famous outside, which goes to show how

the current settings are not healthy for

a career in Zimbabwe dedicated solely

to writing without any major sidehustles.

In fact, let me rearrange it thus:

writing is the side-hustle. Universities

used to nurture the culture of reading

and also provide a platform for writers

to be famous, especially because of the

existence of English and African Languages

Departments where literature was being

read and studied. But with the current

belief that literature is not central to

innovation and industrialisation, and

the subsequent crumbling of these

departments at some local universities,

the support network has been heavily

compromised. So, the prospects are not

very encouraging, but I am convinced that

the sector will survive, especially because

of the dedication and hard work of some

people who still believe in literature.

TM: Tell us about your work as a literary

critic. What books/writers would you

recommend to those wanting to delve into

Zimbabwean literature for the first time?

TC: Zimbabwe is a vast country with

incredible talent. It also incorporates

the Zimbabwean diaspora which, as you

are aware, has been doing extremely

amazing work and giving us something

to be proud of, especially at a time when

things to be proud of are hard to locate.

Thus, I cannot give a truly representative

list of Zimbabwean writing without being

influenced by my own biases. But, I get

disappointed when talking to a wannabe

Zimbabwean writer who proudly tells me

that he/she hasn’t read the Mungoshis,

Marechera, Hove, Vera, Dangarembga,

Zimunya, Chinodya, Nyamufukudza,

Chiundura Moyo, Tsodzo and so on. These

are the godfathers and godmothers who

created the tradition of Zimbabwean

writing! I haven’t spoken of the generation

that follows, the whole line up to the

present day … writers with an international

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following. I usually ask them, so, who the

hell have you been reading?

As a critic and academic, I am also

involved in lots of research that focus on

new publications or re-readings of old

ones. For instance, I have published three

different papers on Chenjerai Hove’s

Bones and am currently working on a

fourth publication. The good thing about

academic publications is that they are

like adverts; they direct academics’ focus

towards particular writings; in this case,

literary texts. I also review books on my

blog. A new review attracts around ninety

readers some of whom go on to ask where

they can get the book.

Books Collective. This means it can be

purchased on the African Books Collective

website. It’s available on Amazon as well.

We also have a distribution channel that

has been set up specifically for those who

are in Zimbabwe. The number to get in

touch with is +263785467289. For the local

market, we are also coming up with a

deal that involves Book Fantastics, a local

mobile bookshop that is doing amazing

work. I will be posting the details on my

Facebook page and Twitter handle soon.

TM: What other works have you written?

Are you currently working on any new

writing projects? Where can readers

access your work?

TC: As I mentioned earlier, I have a

published short story titled ‘Days of the

Sun’. Other unpublished ones include

‘Where Death Naps’, ‘The Anatomy of

Grief’, How not to be an Angry Zimbabwean

Woman … or Entanglements’, and ‘Tales

of a Cat in its Ninth Life’ (this one started

as a writing duet with a friend and after

the excitement of starting had fizzled out,

I decided to convert it into a short story.

Please don’t tell her…yet).

I am still writing poems, this time in

both Shona and English, and occasionally

posting one or two on Whatsapp, Facebook,

Twitter and Instagram. I already have

the titles in my mind but I cannot be

certain about them. Titles change. Who

remembers The Dying City? I have also

finished working on my first novel and the

reviews are back. Right now, I am surfing

the internet for agents and publishers and

approaching them and pitching my work.

This is a very recent development so I am

still waiting for the first responses.

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Because Sadness is Beautiful? is being

distributed internationally by African

FEATURED

AUTHOR

Peace Adzo Medie

HIS

ONLY

WIFE

An Interview with

PEACE ADZO MEDIE

Take a writing class and I guarantee

that your instructor at some point will

emphasize the importance of the opening

sentence of your novel or story. It should

invite, entice, intrigue, tease, provoke,

compel, grab the reader’s attention with

the promise of an unforgettable journey.

Often noted as a classic example is the

opening sentence of Pride and Prejudice

by Jane Austen - “It is a truth universally

acknowledged, that a single man in

possession of a good fortune, must be

in want of a wife.” Written in 1813, it still

resounds across the globe with wit and

charm.

Few writers achieve the lofty goal of an

explosive and arresting opening sentence.

Peace Adzo Medie nails it. “Elikem married

me in absentia; he did not come to our

wedding.” In eleven words, I was hooked.

I read His Only Wife in one day. It was

everything that the opening sentence

promised it would be, and more.

Having been absolutely delighted by her

debut novel, I recently caught up with

Peace and asked her to share with Mosi oa

Tunya Literary Review a bit about herself

and her writing journey:


PAM: Peace Adzo Medie

TM: Tell us about yourself - where you are

from, where you live, where you studied,

where you work?

PAM: I’m Ghanaian and was born in

Liberia. I’m currently a Senior Lecturer

in Gender and International Politics at

the University of Bristol. I have a BA in

Geography from the University of Ghana,

an MA in International Studies from

Ohio University, and a PhD in Public and

International Affairs from the University of

Pittsburgh.

TM: How would you describe your writing

journey and the inspiration that led to your

debut novel His Only Wife. How has your

work in Gender and International Politics

influenced your storytelling?

PAM: I began writing when I was about

ten years old and wrote for myself. I wrote

because I ran out of books to read and so

I wrote stories and novellas that I wanted

to read. I wrote a few book length works

of fiction as a teenager but didn’t write as

much when I was in university, because of

my heavy workload. I started working again

when I was completing my PhD. This is

when I began working on the manuscript

that became His Only Wife.

TM: His Only Wife has had much success

internationally since its publication in

September 2020, including being named

a New York Times Notable Book of the

Year, a Time Magazine Must-Read Book

of 2020, and a Reese’s Book Club October

Pick. What has it been like working with

Reese Witherspoon and her book club to

popularize His Only Wife?

PAM: It's been a pleasure working

with Reese’s Book Club. It’s a great

team of people that does an excellent

job of promoting books and building a

community of book lovers. I’ve very much

enjoyed being a part of this community.

TM: What challenges have you faced as

an author from Liberia and Ghana telling

a story that is set in Africa for a global

audience? What advice would you give

to aspiring African writers who wish to

publish short stories and novels in Africa

and abroad?

PAM: I just wrote what I wanted and

believed that the book would eventually

be published and that when published,

the story would find its audience. Several

publishers passed on the manuscript but

my publishers, Algonquin Books, liked and

wanted the story. I think writers should

write the story that they want to tell, the

one that is close to their heart, that moves

them. While that story will likely not appeal

to everyone, it will find its audience.

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TM: What is your favorite book? Which authors have influenced your writing?

PAM: My favorite book is One Hundred Years of Solitude. It was the first book that got

me thinking about writing as a craft, as opposed to only something that I did for myself

because I wanted more books to read. I enjoy works by so many writers, including Tsitsi

Dangaremgba, Isabel Allende, and Zadie Smith.

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SPECIAL

FEATURE

Chipo Chung

Narrating

Audiobooks

In Conversation With CHIPO CHUNG

Recently, I had the pleasure of chatting with a fellow alum of the Dominican Convent High

School in Harare, Chipo Chung. Well-renowned for her acting achievements, you may

recognize her from Into the Badlands, Doctor Who, and A.D. The Bible Continues, to name

but a few. A graduate of Yale University and The Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, Chipo’s love

for storytelling goes beyond theater, television, and film, to include narrating audiobooks.

For those who appreciate the art of listening, her voice brings to life Zimbabwean stories as

she reads The Book of Memory and The News of Her Death by Petina Gappah, and Nervous

Conditions and The Book of Not by Tsitsi Dangarembga. In conversation via Whatsapp here

in Harare, Chipo shared with Mosi oa Tunya Literary Review, not only of her experience

recording audiobooks, but wonderful insights into literature, reading, and listening:


CC: Chipo Chung

TM: How did you get into narrating

audiobooks?

CC: I read An Elegy for Easterly and

was a big fan of [Petina Gappah's] work.

Sometime between An Elegy of Easterly

and The Book of Memory, we met and

became friends, so we knew each other.

She specifically requested that I read The

Book of Memory for her. She really wanted

me to be the voice of that character and

I appreciated that because the way that

the acting business works is that you are

kind of siloed to what your experience

is - so if your experience is theater, your

next job will be theater, if you do radio

then you do radio, if you do television then

you do television. I always wanted to do

audiobooks because I am a good reader

and I’ve always been a good reader. I loved

reading books when I was younger, and

in the school plays at Blakiston [Primary

School in Harare], I can remember I was

always the narrator, which was always

quite boring, because you didn’t get to

play Mary, but I had a good reading voice.

I always wanted to read books, but it’s

always a closed shop to get into anything,

so I appreciated Petina really pushing

that she wanted me to read that book for

her. And, it being Petina, Petina being a

creative, she was very involved, she was

present for the whole of the reading of

the book, and was able to coach me on

particular parts of it, some of them being in

Shona, and some of them being in various

accents. She was very impressed with my

accent. I am not a Shona speaker, but she

says I have a very good Manyika accent. So

it was great to have her there and to have

that kind of collaborative experience.

Reading audiobooks is very challenging.

It’s very hard work and in fact after reading

Petina’s book, I did say that it is the hardest

work that an actor does because if you

work in film or television, you get paid very

well to sit around a lot, and in theater you

get paid less, but you also have processing

time, whereas when you’re reading an

audiobook, it’s just you talking the entire

time, and you may read the same page two

or three times. Of course you have to read

the book beforehand, then you have to do

the preparation, so for the amount of time

invested in it, it is really quite exhausting.

But, I was thrilled with the opportunity to

do it and l love Petina’s writing, so that’s

how I got into it.

TM: How did growing up in Zimbabwe

help you bring to life the voices and the

characters? Do you think it is necessary to

have some sort of connection to the culture

and the stories in a book to be able to

narrate it well?

CC: It depends on the book, of course....

When some people hear my name they

expect to hear the voice of a Chinese man....

When it is just your voice, you can be

anyone. I trained at the Royal Academy of

Dramatic Art. I would be very happy to read

a Jane Austen novel. I’m equipped to do

that. When it comes to reading culturally

specific books, I think then we may have

issues….I could read a book from India

and think that I was convincing, but to an

Indian person, they might find my accents

insulting. So, of course I could read Petina’s

book because even though I don’t speak

the language, I do recognize the characters

and the diversity of the characters, and the

settings. There is’t the amount of research

one would have to do to understand what

kind of school she is talking about, what

kind of police officer she is talking about.

So, that’s why Petina was so determined

that I should read that book because I

would be able to understand the character

who is basically a black Zimbabwean

girl who is essentially raised by a white,

Rhodesian guy, so she spoke with not just

a “nose brigade,” but with a Rhodie accent,

which is very specific to have that be the

voice of the narrator, as well as all the

other characters.

People from our country are very proud

of our country, and they will be the ones

listening, and it is very easy for them to

pick out when things are inauthentic.

And in this day and age when we have

successful Zimbabwean artists, and artists

from different African countries, there

is no reason why you can’t get a Ghanain

actor to read a Ghanaian book, and a

Zimbabwean actor to read a Zimbabwean

book. If you are not doing that, then you are

just lazy and haven’t looked hard enough.

TM: Was your experience narrating Tsitsi

Dangarembga’s Nervous Conditions similar

to the process of working with Petina

Gappah?

CC: Well, no….I [had previously done]

two books that are on Audible, so the

publisher asked for me. [In addition

"

Art speaks above the NGO/

Charity agenda to capture

the essence of what the

experience is of oppression...

"

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to Nervous Conditions] I also read The

Book of Not [by Tsitsi Dangarembga].

Tsitsi very successfully wrote the final

book in the trilogy, This Mournable Body,

which did very well, but they had that

recorded by someone else already. So,

with the publisher choosing to [record the

earlier books in the trilogy after the last

one], Tsitsi wasn’t really involved in the

development.

They are very different books - Nervous

Conditions, The Book of Not, and This

Mournable Body, with The Book of Not

perhaps being the most challenging. This

Mournable Body....is more the degraded

version of Zimbabwe, and [in] Nervous

Conditions....there’s this hope of a new

Zimbabwe to it, whereas The Book of Not

sort of sits in between the two. There’s a

basic optimism to Nervous Conditions that

if you work hard and you are bright, you

can achieve...education provides you with

opportunities. Whereas This Mournable

Body represents the fragmentation of

society…..and the exploitation of whatever

we can use to make a buck to survive. The

Book of Not therefore has this declining

cynicism throughout it, so it’s quite

challenging.

It was different [from my experience

recording Petina’s book] because I

recorded them here in Harare....just last

month. It was a real pleasure because I was

working in Zim, which I never do, so it felt

really good to get in the car and drive to

work in Harare, at a small recording studio

here, and have the two people I’m working

with, the Director and the Sound Recorder

be Zimbabwean.

Nervous Conditions really is an African

classic. It’s a brilliant book. It had been

twenty years since I last read it, but it is

one of those books that doesn’t grow old.

It is a kind of book of genius really. It reads

so well. One thing I will say about Tsitsi,

as a reader, because reading out loud is

slightly different from reading in your

head, because it requires breath….she

writes really long sentences, many many

subclauses, and that was quite challenging

to read, but also quite astounding because

the trajectory of thought would be

maintained through sentences that are

like half a paragraph. It was challenging to

read, but at the same time, the voices are

so clear. In Nervous Conditions, she has

these wonderful voices. I’ve never read a

play by Tsitsi, but many years ago she used

to write plays, and she has gone on to make

films. In Nervous Conditions, you can just

hear the specificity of the characters so

clearly, and as an actor that is a wonderful

opportunity to read. So that was a pleasure.

The other pleasure [I had while working in

Harare] was that I got to set the schedule.

We would record maybe two days a week

instead of every consecutive day, so it

wasn’t as exhausting as other books I’ve

read.

TM: You’ve worked with various

organizations that empower women

over the years. Nervous Conditions and

The Book of Memory have strong female

characters. Has your work with women

around the world fed into how you read the

voices of the women in these books?

CC: Nervous Conditions...when I

was reading it, I related it back to my

upbringing and to what it means to be

a woman in Zimbabwean society or in a

patriarchal society. It’s very clear what

that book is about. Finding one’s voice as a

young woman and the difference between

what happens to the narrator character

and her cousin Nyasha who is very wellread,

and very intellectual, and very

outspoken, and I suppose very Western.

What happens to Nyasha at the end of the

book, because she is caged by this very

authoritative, masculine figure….to me it

really spoke of male authority figures when

I was growing up. Tsitsi was doing that

wonderful magical thing of talking about

a whole society while talking about very

specific individuals. For me that’s part of

the greatness of that book. It is quite subtly

able to revere the traditional family, as well

as critique it. It’s a real analysis of society....

P

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It’s not superficial.

So, has my work with other women’s

organizations affected my work? No. It just

makes me appreciate when a woman writer

is really using art. Art speaks above the

NGO/Charity agenda to capture the essence

of what the experience is of oppression,

and to give you greater understanding. In

the end, a lot of my work with charities

and NGOs is about trying to get a better

understanding of people’s experiences, and

I think that art is able to do that in a much

faster way.

My experience in theater….I’ve done

quite a number of verbatim plays - using

verbatim the testimony of people who I

interviewed….so they are like documentary

plays. There is so much drama in real life,

and when you listen to the real voices of

people, even if they are acted by actors, it

is quite astounding what can be revealed by

that.

I haven’t listened to that many audiobooks,

but I got into it last year. I listened to a

fantastic book...I’d look out the window and

take in what was being said...and I’d have to

stop after an hour to just take that in. It was

a wonderful experience learning to listen

differently, because I’m not a person who

has been big into radio. Radio is always

something in the background, as opposed

to just sitting and focusing and listening.

I think it's quite a special experience and

opportunity. With a book like Nervous

Conditions….especially at this time when

we can’t go to the theater….there is

something of being in the audience and

having someone perform for you...to have

that theatrical experience. I feel that about

Nervous Conditions because it has some

real high drama and lots of characters.

I really enjoyed that as well. I know Petina

is planning on getting the whole of Rotten

Row read by different voices, so I guess

I’m already involved in that. I love reading

and actually these days I spend more time

reading scripts and reading for work than

actually reading for fun, so it was quite nice

reading these two books because they were

forcing me to….well they were still reading

for work...but to read fiction. I’m looking

forward to doing more.

TM: What are your favorite books? Or a

favorite book if you have one?

CC: A Suitable Boy. I think it’s in three

volumes, but I had it as like a 1000-page

book all bound together. I can remember

getting to about page 750 and being like

“oh no we are near the end” and getting

really depressed with still like 150 pages

to go. That’s how good that book is. For

someone who doesn’t get to read a lot, just

remembering reading that book and not

wanting it to end...that is one of the best

books I’ve read.

TM: With your love for books and narrating

books, do you write at all, or have any plans

to write?

CC: That has been the great gift of

lockdown actually is I have started writing.

TM: Do you have any plans to narrate more

audiobooks in the future?

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CC: I really enjoyed these last two. I also, a

few years ago, read The News of Her Death,

which is one of Petina Gappah’s stories in

Rotten Row, that is currently on a podcast.

CALL FOR

SUBMISSIONS

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CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS

FOR ISSUE #3

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Narrating Autobooks

Chipo Chung

PAGE 74

Ndebele Poems

PAGE 52

MOSI OA TUNYA

Literary Review

the smoke that thunders

Mosi oa Tunya Literary Review ISSUE #2

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