IEvening in the Rift Valley
Setting Sun, orange skies,
Shadows appear, darkened plains
Cool, scented, even mysterious,
A lost world.
Insects scream and whistle
A leopard barks in the valley,
Hunting baboons. The warm wind
Rises over the Rift, hitting, powerful;
Standing motionless against the sky, above.
African Beggar
Squatting in the hot dry murrum dust
At the side of the road, white-haired,
His black blanket clutched round his pitiful brown body,
He stares vacantly out of his one reasonable eye.
His hands, claw-like, clasp his stick.
A reptilian film of dry skin covers his arms and legs.
Red suppurating sores, festering in the mid-day sun,
Pockmark his limbs, a feast for the
Dozen buzzing flies, treading on, and licking the delicacy.
His face, hideously distorted by leprosy, a mask of flesh.
The nose gone, the mouth a toothless hole, dried up.
The acacias offer no shade from the sun.
