Memorial
Sacred to the memory of Harry St. George Galt, Acting Sub-Commissioner of the Western province who was murdered at Ibanda on 19th of May in 1905 by a native of Ankole. This cross has been erected by the direction of His Excellency H. Hesketh – Bell CML H.M. Governor of Uganda as a memorial to an excellent and deeply regretted officer 1908.
Bwana, your ghost is the sing of whips in my kin’s memory you incised my throat like you were bleeding a goat you hewed out chunks of me and rock upon rock rifle like a second hand you made them build you a pyramid like we needed to remember you like we would forget the way home if the road did not bear your name like we would forget the stain of your footprint the whoosh of your whip how could we forget you when death licked lips at the sound of your footfall
when my kin shrunk themselves to stow their bodies in granaries the days you charged in collecting your colonial tax & the millet that fed them became the sand that dislodged air from their lungs as they squatted still and submerged in baskets of grain waiting for you to move on to the next yard
yet you always stayed too long
like you knew the men and muscled boys were clogged with their own tongues & their spines were cracking yielding to the confine of space bent to your reign I will always remember how you stood there counting the smoke rings from your pipe like each was a minute in the countdown as their sinews slackened and lost grip of their bodies.
Shape of An Epitaph
landmarks shift/become unfixed — Kei Miller
Your real epitaph was not the words they wrote on your grave.
it
was
in the shape
of something
that grew into a pyramid
where you died. each stone
a stone that belonged to a hill.
each stone a body that once had air.
each stone a scar-less skin. each stone
a shard of the land you pocketed. each
stone a name you swallowed. each stone a wound
each stone a god you drowned. each stone would not hold, later
the grass would grow but we would still remember because we took back the stones to build our houses. we stacked the rooms with pots, spears, gourds, beads, raffia baskets, shells, calabashes, moonstones, umbilical cords of our children, anything that felt like us, and convinced us we were forgetting you.
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