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All that Africa is gone from me now.
There is no continent
where once it crept in my heart,
tectonic.
No canvas tent survives to tell
of water buffalo just outside the flap
or elephants looming in darkness
beyond the mothy lantern light.
There is no VW bus named Zinjanthropus
for you to practice packing the night before,
and pack again at dawn.
There is no high plantation
from which you can carry me down,
head reeling from the mountain air.
I can’t put a pocketknife beside you
to show the scale of your life in a photograph.
Mzee, I will lay you down gently
in the creek bed where we found you,
old hand axe,
and I will dust off my hands,
and walk back to the car,
and my eyes will try to see the valley,
but my heart will feel only the rift.
March 27 2023
