Before the sun

Before the sun

Before the sun

Intense blue morning
promising early heat
and later in the afternoon,
heavy rain.


The bright chips
fly from the sharp axe
for some distance through the air,
arc,
and eternities later,
settle down in showers
on the dewy grass.


It is a big log:
but when you are fourteen
big logs
are what you want.


The wood gives off
a sweet nose-cleansing odour
which (unlike sawdust)
doesn\'t make one sneeze.


It sends up a thin spiral
of smoke which later straightens
and flutes out
to the distant sky: a signal
of some sort,
or a sacrificial prayer.


The wood hisses,
The sparks fly.


And when the sun
finally shows up
in the East like some
latecomer to a feast
I have got two cobs of maize
ready for it.


I tell the sun to come share
with me the roasted maize
and the sun just winks
like a grown-up.


So I go ahead, taking big
alternate bites:
one for the sun,
one for me.
This one for the sun,
this one for me:
till the cobs
are just two little skeletons
in the sun.