Jungle Sounds by Susan Kiguli

In seasons when
The grass trembles with thirst
And trees crackle
Under the ruthless furnace;
Farmers rejoice at a lone feathery cloud
A false promise of rain:
Thus we stand in arid deserts
Clinging desperately to fallacies
Refusing to believe...
Justice is not here with us.

Justice,
At the festivities of your adversaries
Your absence cuts through our unaneasthetised flesh
Keen as a surgeon's knife.
Searing pain numbs our hearts
Leaving them limp lumps.
Your absence is a warrior's sword
A silver dagger in a foe's hand
Cutting down the sons and daughters of the land.

In your continued dearth
We are cowardly hyenas,
Running away from jungle sounds
Soiling our legs
Seized by desperate madness.
You, mirage of our lives
We pant after your shadow
Like thirsty desert Tuaregs
Our shrunken tongues
Cannot even croak your name.

Let the seasons go on holiday
Let there be a sun-moon battle
Forcing curfew on night and day
We rather the earth stood on tip-toe
Than smell the aroma of justice
Wafting to us always from afar