Murdering with Smiles

Murdering with Smiles

Murdering with smiles is a modern game.

Yes, we all this time agree and accept

That well as,

We smile smiles of those who smile

And talk talks of those who talk

And cry cries of those who cry

And laugh laughs of those who laugh

Still, honesty contends our recurrent pretense.

When I lost my son, I promptly cursed plagues

And though the post-mortem ink noticed poison

In his clotted blood, we killed one of our eyes in

Anguished presumption that plagues too have venom

And chose to forget the meals that the deceased

Ate on my brother’s own table and we thought less

Of the water he gulped on his auntie’s calabash.

I remember the fatal hour when

A piercing arrow struck my back in the hunting hills

My very offender presumably carried my torn skin

On a thorny stretcher, crying sorrowfully

In frank-like pity (though masking the malice)

And all the others’ kin lips praised him hero

As they kissed and blessed him redeemer.

Since we peg our verdict on folks to the open

Not suspicion, the smiling murders take chance

Since we smile because they too have smiled

Since we weep because they too have wept,

They choose to silently sting while we dance

Well, I know open rules over secret but surely

Secret forever kills her master. And those

In intrigue are the death-makers of those not

And those not, often artless victims.
                                               Rurekyera Geofrey