SELECTED POETRY

by
Eveline Pye

CULTURE SHOCK

At the butcher�s shop
the pigs� heads line up
on the top shelf,

stare straight ahead
indifferent,
like Lords of the Flies.

A legless man
has a plank of wood
with wheels

and dark red bandages
around his fists.
I want to close my eyes.

A young boy grabs my bag.

He is so dirty
his black skin looks grey.

I hold his wrist
and hit him. He is too weak
to fight.

Snakes try to bite my naked feet.
I want to beat them off
with a stick.

� Eveline Pye

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TIMES OF ZAMBIA

(Friday, June 25 1982)

I

�Stop forcing women to marry you
in return for medical treatment�

The traditional healers association
appeals to unscrupulous herbalists.


II

Chief Mukuni is to demolish
a shanty township

for harbouring criminals
pretending to be fishtraders.

These people have no rights because
they have no registration cards.


III

The defence of intoxication
by alcohol and drugs

was ruled out by the judge.
Three Mongu villagers

are sentenced to death
for killing the witch doctor.

� Eveline Pye

---

THE ROYAL PRINCE

We worked together
in the office at the end of the corridor -
the white woman
who was supposed to be
some kind of a mathematician
and the black man
who said he was a royal prince.

He would talk of the Lozi tribe
his father, the Litunga
who wore a leopard skin
as he sat in the royal barge
leading the procession upriver
before the rains.

I would describe a childhood
of winter winds and snowmen,
icicles and frosted windows,
hot fires,
draughts and chilblains.

One day, I spoke
of the Union with England
and the Scottish Lords
selling out a heritage
for bags of gold

and he showed me a picture
of his great, great grandfather
smiling, as he signed away
the mining rights
of the entire Lozi nation
for two thousand pounds a year.

The face in the photograph
was the same as his -
all dressed up
for an English coronation
in a top hat and frock coat.

He was carrying a club
on its head
the carving of a lion.

� Eveline Pye

---

LOCUSTS

Lunchtime,
I see him catching locusts
tearing off wings
cramming them
into a paper bag.

All afternoon
they rustle on his desk.

I think he must hate locusts
even more
than he hates snakes.

I imagine a famine,
crops devastated,
a hungry child crying,

but I�ve got it wrong
he likes them -

deep fried
with green bananas.

� Eveline Pye

---

RESPECT

The news begins, as usual,
�Today President Kaunda said...�
Then, the words stop coming.

The newsreader�s hands
reach out, as though he�s begging.
He screams one word:

�Father�, and then grief
streams out of him. I stare at his floral tie
wait for someone to pull the plug

but no one does. This is Africa.
Here, grief demands respect.
I sit in front of the television set,

stunned - unable to move
as a layer of time, a protective skin,
is stripped away.

� Eveline Pye

---

A MASSIVE YES VOTE

The Party will no longer
tolerate candidates
who insult it, or its leadership.

With the exception of MPs
holding high posts in the party,
campaigners speak as though

they were in opposition.
People do not want to hear
about imaginary corruption.

You are free to campaign
for the re-election of the President.
One Party - One Nation.

� Eveline Pye

---

THE LUNAR RAINBOW

(Friday, June 25 1982)

I walk down the darkening path
to the Victoria Falls -
through a wilderness of bushes
long grasses, and Vervet monkeys.

Daylight leaves,
like a flock of flamingo
startled on a land-locked lake.
I hear the sound of beating wings
as water falls on stone.

On the edge of the chasm
touching the sucking beauty
of death, I see colours
in the black and silver sky.

An arc of pale pastel hangs
in the moonlight. Smiling,
loving the impossible,
I hate the reality of morning.

� Eveline Pye

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LEAVING AFRICA

I

All day, I sit by the waterhole
preparing myself. A hippo senses
coolness in the air, drags her body
out of mud. A leopard comes alive

and falls out of the Baobab tree.
The last Kudu twists his corkscrew horns
up to the sky, and heads off into the bush.
It�s time to leave the village.

You appear, head shaved in grief,
ask me to stay� one more time.
You are shouting and crying as I tie
the child to my back. The Land Rover

comes in clouds of dust.
A snake discards its skin
and emerges smooth as an eel.
I am quietly peeling off years of love

shedding my black skin. You never see
but underneath, I am red raw
bleeding from the loss of you
slithering in dry sand.

� Eveline Pye

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