I was seven…
seven…
just seven

A seed…
not yet called sapling.

She,
a cousin
twice ripened
breasts like twin oranges
straining thin cloth,
hips like two drums
beating beneath her wrapper.

She said:
“Let me show you
how fire sleeps
in a woman’s belly.”

I was a lamb
tethered to her whisper.
I was a drum
she beat
behind shut doors.
She said the blood
trapped,
mapping my buttocks,
pulsed her bud
awake,
called the wet god
from
between her thighs.

I was seven…
seven…
just seven.

My dreams
still reek
of roasted innocence 
of sweat-slick floors,
of bitten lips,
of the lullaby
she moaned
into my ear
while I clenched
my toy soldier.

Those nights
the nights
ate my voice.
The ceiling blinked,
but did not speak.
Even the Tesbih
turned its face.
My thighs
learned silence
before they knew hair.

I was seven…
seven…
just seven.

Tell me:
when the antelope cries
in laughter,
who knows it is bleeding?

The world says:
“Boy, you’re lucky!”
Lucky?
Like a yam
forced
to sprout
in harmattan?

If the boys speak
the sky will refuse to blink.
Courts will stutter.
Graves will cough.

If the boys speak
there will be no room
in the prisons,
no more silk wrappers
in churches.
Wigged women will
gnaw their lips
like termites
chewing
rafters
at night.

For how many boys
were taught manhood
by the mouths of women
who wore Sunday dresses
and shame like perfume?

Ask the mirror:
who holds the dagger;
the hand that cuts
or the smile that says,
“This is our little secret”?

I say
if fire eats only houses,
not forests,
it is because
the wind is still silent.

But let the boys speak
and the wind
will carry the names
of aunties
who lit bushfires
in the hearts
of sleeping boys.

I was seven…
seven…
just seven.