What’s eats up Baba?
Musembi wa Ndaita
self-translated from Kiikamba by the poet

Quarrels and fights are to father as a spoon is to a plate,
once a serene dove unfazed by life’s storms,
his tongue, a river of honey, tales like melodies from a radio,
but now, Baba and quarrels, inseparable as conjoined twins.
 
Quarrels and fights are to father as tea is to a cup,
once bold as simba, never bowed, he’s a hen that’s sighted an eagle,
Monday an invalid in bed, Tuesday the market and alcohol.
 

Quarrels and fights are to father as alcohol is to the village drunk,
after mother left, left for Zamani, the land of our ancestors,
and Baba left, left in the land of pumpkins and sweet potatoes,
Baba’s heart dark, mouth burdened with the weight of lost love.

Tata nikyau?
Musembi wa Ndaita


Tata ndata na iteta, nota isaani na kisiko,
tata ndanetetaa, anai muui ta ivui,
wasya muyo ta uki, ngewa tu ta kameme.
Indu yu, tata na iteta, nota ivatha na yingi.
 
Tata ndata na iteta, nota kikombe na Kyai,
tata ndanetetaa, ukumbau wa Munyambu,
indi yu, tata wia nota nguku yoona kilui,
waambililya kitandani ta muwau, wakeli soko na uki.
 
Tata ndata na iteta, nota kimee na muthengi,
mami athi kuu, kuu kwaa aumae,
nake tata atiwa kuu kwaa malenge na makwasi,
ngoo ya tata kivindu tu na iteta tu.

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Musembi wa Ndaita, originally from Kenya, is a writer based in Philadelphia. His poem is in Kiikamba, a Bantu language of Kenya. He was longlisted for the 2022 Commonwealth Short Story Prize. His non-fiction and fiction has appeared or is forthcoming in Africology, In the Sands of Time, the other side of hope, Diaspora Messenger, and Mere Orthodoxy.

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