(A Preface to Potashian Eschatological Discourse)
"Why do you look for the living among the dead?
He is not here; he has risen!" (Luke 24:5,6)
"Maranatha!" Wailed the mother, which is to mean, our lord come. "Come down father and do not just send Michael," that good woman wailed. Such is the remonstrance of a mother for a fallen son. E'en when that son is a vexation to the public.
"Your son is not dead," said the administration policeman, "...he sleeps!"
"For death remembered should be like a mirror, who tells us. life's but breath, to trust in error." (Pericles)
I came to in the backroom of Hezekiah Kinyua MD (Quack)...
"in my begining is my end" -T.S.Eliot
How I had wanted to hear it said, "Behold...he has risen!" But resurrection is the priviledge of the dead.
Death eludes me- in the same way success, in my mortal pursuits, does.
I have been to the mountain top and I have seen the promised land quoth Dr.King.
"Aaron shall be gathered to his people, for he shall not enter the land which I have given to the children of Israel" (Numbers 20:24)
Dr. King at the fateful balcony, Aaron at Mt. Hor, Potash...at Turd Mountain....waiting!
Hues of meaning: Ther is the death that is an end to life; and the death that is living an empty life.
Everyday I die!
Heri Kufa macho kuliko kufa moyo- It is better to die in the eye than to die in the soul.
(And now to a long-standing appointment with the Necromancer)
Thursday, March 16, 2006
Thursday, March 09, 2006
EXIT HYMN
"Eloi, Eloi, Lama Sabachtani"
My ego- crucified. My superego- A chalk outline on the potholed Macadam.
To be or not to be, that is the question...
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time...
When he himself might his quietus make...
(Hamlet)
You chose life, I chose death.
On the evening of the first day, the police came to cut out his body.
The Public: What a disgrace, he wasn't gonna amount to anything, anyhow...
The Stone Zoners: "...his life was gentle; and the elements so mix'd in him..." (That is Timi, I know- You can kep my pocket Shakespeare, kid. Read it in Memory of me.)
On the morrow. Interview with Lucifer. "Abaddon, I send thee a helper..." No Master. "Hakuna Kazi"
Later on taht day. Celestial Boardroom. "Gabriel, what sayest thou?" We will call you later, I swear!
They rejected him in death, as in life. Purgatory. Hell. Heaven. Hades...Perdition.
A departed spirit in lacking gainful employment on other planes must return to this one to torment the living. Petulant Poltergeist.
(Aside: Beware, Ceaser. Beware the Ides of March. "...but who would have thought the old man to have so much blod"- Macbeth)
On the morning of the third day, he was; and yet he wasn't: Demon, Daemon or Deity.
The body lies at City Mortuary. Only twenty people at the funeral: where there should have ben multitudes. Fifteen of them cling to their Napshizzle. Escapism. But they pooled funds to pour something better into his shallow rave. Maybe a Kenya Cane.
An unmarked grave at Langata.
But someday one of these hapless kids will earn a flags-at-half-mast...
Thai, Thathaiya, Ngai!
He Rested in Poverty.
Insurrection or Resurrection; by one or the other, Potash will live again!
My ego- crucified. My superego- A chalk outline on the potholed Macadam.
To be or not to be, that is the question...
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time...
When he himself might his quietus make...
(Hamlet)
You chose life, I chose death.
On the evening of the first day, the police came to cut out his body.
The Public: What a disgrace, he wasn't gonna amount to anything, anyhow...
The Stone Zoners: "...his life was gentle; and the elements so mix'd in him..." (That is Timi, I know- You can kep my pocket Shakespeare, kid. Read it in Memory of me.)
On the morrow. Interview with Lucifer. "Abaddon, I send thee a helper..." No Master. "Hakuna Kazi"
Later on taht day. Celestial Boardroom. "Gabriel, what sayest thou?" We will call you later, I swear!
They rejected him in death, as in life. Purgatory. Hell. Heaven. Hades...Perdition.
A departed spirit in lacking gainful employment on other planes must return to this one to torment the living. Petulant Poltergeist.
(Aside: Beware, Ceaser. Beware the Ides of March. "...but who would have thought the old man to have so much blod"- Macbeth)
On the morning of the third day, he was; and yet he wasn't: Demon, Daemon or Deity.
The body lies at City Mortuary. Only twenty people at the funeral: where there should have ben multitudes. Fifteen of them cling to their Napshizzle. Escapism. But they pooled funds to pour something better into his shallow rave. Maybe a Kenya Cane.
An unmarked grave at Langata.
But someday one of these hapless kids will earn a flags-at-half-mast...
Thai, Thathaiya, Ngai!
He Rested in Poverty.
Insurrection or Resurrection; by one or the other, Potash will live again!
Wednesday, March 08, 2006
THE NIGHT OF THE RATTLESNAKES
(The incidental rant of a vindicated Streetosopher)
Thought I told you they came in the night? They always come in the night. But you thought the Napshizzle had finally flambed my sparse grey matter. And when I mentioned uzis and balaclavas, you thought I hadn’t outgrown Hardy Boys. No, Infact you said the inhalations- THC, Nitrous Oxide et al- from my sojourn at Dinda’s Lab had hit critical mass.
When they came for me, you thought I was on an Acid Trip; then they came for you…
Thur, 1045hrs- Wake up
1046 hrs- Stand outside the door waiting for a breakfast half- life
1048hrs- Start walking towards… something
1050hrs- Pick a shirt from the cloths lines to the left ( I have done the right for two days
in a row)
1052hrs- One Love Licker Store- 205 Ml napshizzle- Credit
1053hrs- Baba Jimmy’s Café and Bicycle Repairs- supu ya ashu- credit
(Oops, I haven’t paid them in four days. Think I will pass.)
1058hrs- Mutua’s Kiosk- Safari Mbili- Plus za jana itakuwa ashu- Ongeza kwa bill.
1101hrs- Vaite’s Veve Base- Hola at peeps- dandia a half-life
1106hrs- Kamwana’s Video Parlour- Review his latest, Not- a – camera- copy- I – Swear- VCD of “The Constance Gardenia…’
Having skipped Baba Jimmy’s Café, 1101hrs last Thursday found me parting the beaded entrance into the cavernous depths of Kamwana’s Video Parlour. On a day like that, I expected to find only Kamwana there with the isn’t- he- gorgeous- boy, Timi. That Timi who together with your worthy Narrator acts as the ‘hoods art, literature and Film critic as well as purveyor and connoisseur of all that which is a sine qua non of pseudo-intellectualism. (The Cognoscenti if you will!) Ther are perks deriving from that job including getting to watch all movies at Kamwana’s Video Parlour for free and hyping them up to the public with genteel rhetoric to the tune of: “..He, Hiyo Movie ni kali…!” Or the more enticing: “Kwanza Mutua’s Kiosk is huko in that movie…” That line is probably true in relation to the theatrical release of the movie on show that day but Kamwana’s copy was starring a certain Rachel Wretch, or so I presumed considering the text on the sleeve was in Chinese.
Anyway, I was in for a rude shock. The place was fuller that it gets during the late night “beef’ session ( Si you jua, Six- movies- for – one- ticket…ehe!) All the ‘ hood rats, lager louts, and low- lifes were in there stinking up the place like an overnight nyongi. Njane was ther- nare, bila gaff. Kimi had a nyongi Mary Jane, bile light and Mbech; well Mbech as per kawa was wearing his fingers thin and cackling, “Half- life; Choma Hiyo Fegi” Bila gaff, Bila Blunt Bila Life…aighh…Kizeee!
“Potash, Si you hook me up with a sip!” It is some chick, huko nyuma; Bobo, Kari…who cares? So I Lenga.
“Sup Timi!”
“lupa Dawg…hit me!”
I pass him the Napshizzle. He knocks it against his elbow, twists the cap and guzzles with one fluid move. He passes the can back. It is exactly 102.5 Ml left in there. I know that. Everyone Know that. We call it Level; not a drop more, not a drop less.
“Aightt..aiigghhhtt..” I mumble as I sip leisurely, starring at the screen.
Okay, it is not even a movie all this punks is watching. It is TV. Please. Okay, that is Reverend Musyimi there and the president, huko next to Ms Karua. “What you mean, Musyimi has been appointed to the cabinet?” Not exactly, I am told. But seriously the good Reverend has too many jobs. I get the feeling often times that NARC created the jobs alright and Reverend Musyimi started collecting Tithes in kind. But you cannot begrudge the fellow none: in Kenya the only fellows in constant employ are reverends, Brewers and grave diggers. And the Reverend stays one up because he still has a graveside gig and always gets to celebrate a brew during mass.
Oh…TV! Now I am informed that it is not a swearing in ceremony but rather like the government is launching yet another corrupt body. “Certainly, that is not news!” I observe. Ofcourse it isn’t, everyone agrees. “What we want to know is what they were doing last night!” “Ah, come on, go read Kenya Inconfidential or some…!” I bellow. “If we can find it…” Timi says. “They burnt The Standard.” “You mean B.A.N.N.E.D?” I ask. “No” says Timi “They burnt it like they were trying to prove there is something else that burn better that their Draft Constitution”
“Maranatha….Hell hath no fury like a Government Scorned!”
Readership, when I told you the government had gone more rotten than gonorrheal pudenda, y’all thought I was Tilting at Windmills. Some said the Delirium Tremens had finally set in- like rigour mortis of my brain muscle or something!
TV: Cut to a senior minister struggling with his own security detail for a chance to talk to the press. His security men know his type- they are their own enemies- but the boss prevails. He is after all, Senior Chief Kimendeero- The Boa Constrictor. (And quite an agile fellow he is for his age that can put his foot in his mouth with such ease.)
“Bwana Waziri…”
“If you rattle snake you must be ready to be bitten by it.”
But of course. If my memory does me justice, I recall my grandfather telling me that that is exactly what the ngatis used to tell MauMau apologists before setting their houses on fire…
Addendum
Since they came in the night, I have been looking for a lawyer- pro bono of course- to get me one of those cool things every Tom, Dick and Murgor is getting; anticipatory bail, and stays of prosecution. I need such to stall the snake a while till I get my voter’s card and keep it close… Fimbo ya mbali haiui nyoka!
The hands that picked the voter’s card will pick the next president.
Thought I told you they came in the night? They always come in the night. But you thought the Napshizzle had finally flambed my sparse grey matter. And when I mentioned uzis and balaclavas, you thought I hadn’t outgrown Hardy Boys. No, Infact you said the inhalations- THC, Nitrous Oxide et al- from my sojourn at Dinda’s Lab had hit critical mass.
When they came for me, you thought I was on an Acid Trip; then they came for you…
Thur, 1045hrs- Wake up
1046 hrs- Stand outside the door waiting for a breakfast half- life
1048hrs- Start walking towards… something
1050hrs- Pick a shirt from the cloths lines to the left ( I have done the right for two days
in a row)
1052hrs- One Love Licker Store- 205 Ml napshizzle- Credit
1053hrs- Baba Jimmy’s Café and Bicycle Repairs- supu ya ashu- credit
(Oops, I haven’t paid them in four days. Think I will pass.)
1058hrs- Mutua’s Kiosk- Safari Mbili- Plus za jana itakuwa ashu- Ongeza kwa bill.
1101hrs- Vaite’s Veve Base- Hola at peeps- dandia a half-life
1106hrs- Kamwana’s Video Parlour- Review his latest, Not- a – camera- copy- I – Swear- VCD of “The Constance Gardenia…’
Having skipped Baba Jimmy’s Café, 1101hrs last Thursday found me parting the beaded entrance into the cavernous depths of Kamwana’s Video Parlour. On a day like that, I expected to find only Kamwana there with the isn’t- he- gorgeous- boy, Timi. That Timi who together with your worthy Narrator acts as the ‘hoods art, literature and Film critic as well as purveyor and connoisseur of all that which is a sine qua non of pseudo-intellectualism. (The Cognoscenti if you will!) Ther are perks deriving from that job including getting to watch all movies at Kamwana’s Video Parlour for free and hyping them up to the public with genteel rhetoric to the tune of: “..He, Hiyo Movie ni kali…!” Or the more enticing: “Kwanza Mutua’s Kiosk is huko in that movie…” That line is probably true in relation to the theatrical release of the movie on show that day but Kamwana’s copy was starring a certain Rachel Wretch, or so I presumed considering the text on the sleeve was in Chinese.
Anyway, I was in for a rude shock. The place was fuller that it gets during the late night “beef’ session ( Si you jua, Six- movies- for – one- ticket…ehe!) All the ‘ hood rats, lager louts, and low- lifes were in there stinking up the place like an overnight nyongi. Njane was ther- nare, bila gaff. Kimi had a nyongi Mary Jane, bile light and Mbech; well Mbech as per kawa was wearing his fingers thin and cackling, “Half- life; Choma Hiyo Fegi” Bila gaff, Bila Blunt Bila Life…aighh…Kizeee!
“Potash, Si you hook me up with a sip!” It is some chick, huko nyuma; Bobo, Kari…who cares? So I Lenga.
“Sup Timi!”
“lupa Dawg…hit me!”
I pass him the Napshizzle. He knocks it against his elbow, twists the cap and guzzles with one fluid move. He passes the can back. It is exactly 102.5 Ml left in there. I know that. Everyone Know that. We call it Level; not a drop more, not a drop less.
“Aightt..aiigghhhtt..” I mumble as I sip leisurely, starring at the screen.
Okay, it is not even a movie all this punks is watching. It is TV. Please. Okay, that is Reverend Musyimi there and the president, huko next to Ms Karua. “What you mean, Musyimi has been appointed to the cabinet?” Not exactly, I am told. But seriously the good Reverend has too many jobs. I get the feeling often times that NARC created the jobs alright and Reverend Musyimi started collecting Tithes in kind. But you cannot begrudge the fellow none: in Kenya the only fellows in constant employ are reverends, Brewers and grave diggers. And the Reverend stays one up because he still has a graveside gig and always gets to celebrate a brew during mass.
Oh…TV! Now I am informed that it is not a swearing in ceremony but rather like the government is launching yet another corrupt body. “Certainly, that is not news!” I observe. Ofcourse it isn’t, everyone agrees. “What we want to know is what they were doing last night!” “Ah, come on, go read Kenya Inconfidential or some…!” I bellow. “If we can find it…” Timi says. “They burnt The Standard.” “You mean B.A.N.N.E.D?” I ask. “No” says Timi “They burnt it like they were trying to prove there is something else that burn better that their Draft Constitution”
“Maranatha….Hell hath no fury like a Government Scorned!”
Readership, when I told you the government had gone more rotten than gonorrheal pudenda, y’all thought I was Tilting at Windmills. Some said the Delirium Tremens had finally set in- like rigour mortis of my brain muscle or something!
TV: Cut to a senior minister struggling with his own security detail for a chance to talk to the press. His security men know his type- they are their own enemies- but the boss prevails. He is after all, Senior Chief Kimendeero- The Boa Constrictor. (And quite an agile fellow he is for his age that can put his foot in his mouth with such ease.)
“Bwana Waziri…”
“If you rattle snake you must be ready to be bitten by it.”
But of course. If my memory does me justice, I recall my grandfather telling me that that is exactly what the ngatis used to tell MauMau apologists before setting their houses on fire…
Addendum
Since they came in the night, I have been looking for a lawyer- pro bono of course- to get me one of those cool things every Tom, Dick and Murgor is getting; anticipatory bail, and stays of prosecution. I need such to stall the snake a while till I get my voter’s card and keep it close… Fimbo ya mbali haiui nyoka!
The hands that picked the voter’s card will pick the next president.
Thursday, March 02, 2006
NOT READY TO DIE
“Vanity of vanities”, says the preacher “vanity of vanities, “all is vanity”
What profit has a man from all his labour in which he toils under the sun?
One generation passes away, and another generation comes;
But the earth abides for ever.
(Eccle; Chap. 1)
No greater love hath any man for his life than this. I wouldn’t give my life for seventy seven virgins, everlasting life or such other arcane pursuits of a dogmatic punishment/ reward equation. In my book Martyrs don’t live (They dead see?) Death is a negation of the joy of living; and martyrdom its defilement. I desire to live. Live so well that maybe in death I will have found a fawning band and consequently, a resurrection. I want to walk; even though I walk as Barnabas or that there Dinda.
Take a look at life’s ironies. They send you out as cannon fodder and you are lucky if you bring back a Purple Heart. For most there is nothing but a plaque at the grave of the Unknown Soldier, while others gain no more than an MIA after their names. Their folks cannot even honour their memories with a shallow grave,. And if they do, it is never too long before the private developer with his earth mover and luxury apartments takes a right royal piss on their parade. All that that soldier gets for giving his life for God and country is a ‘piss out Parade’. But the general, he returns home in an air- conditioned limo; retires to a political career illustrated with Government Defence Contracts.
Isn’t it ironic, that everyday kids are stopping strong bullets as they fight for ‘one of their own’ to put his itchy fingers in the till of some Harambee Avenue dukawala. Evidently, that is how Kenyatta saw it when he preached Harambee- that we all pool our meager resources together and give them to one fellow that he may advance himself. Because of Harambee and martyrs, Uhuru Kenyatta is worth 10 Million USD and Kimathi’s son- well did he have a son, who knows?- cannot even find his father’s grave to pour libation.
Kids die on these streets for tribal chiefs whose on children are out in England getting a quality education and fraternizing with the kind of women we cannot visualize beyond the images on the grainy VCDs at Kamwana’s Video Shack. Their children while away time waiting to return and take care of their father’s business, but you and I have nothing to return to. That Zero by Zero plot at the squatter settlement that you killed your brother for? When your daddy died at Mama Pima’s last July you never went to claim his body, you let the council dump him in a mass grave- ‘A Carcass for Hounds’. (You have nowhere to bury your dead.) Yet when that tribal chief dies, you will be at KICC for the Harambee. A Harambee to offset medical bills from Nairobi hospital all the way to a spa in Southern France. Then there is the matter of the good people ay Lee Funeral making him look like ‘a feast for the gods’- before the State Funeral.
I am no Martyr and unlike Bono, I have no Messianic Complex. I am not ready to die that children may be free. Free from what? This Quixotic existence of mine spent sitting on those stones, sipping on Napshizzle and Tilting at Windmills? Windmills that in turn become a government more rotten than gonorrheal pudenda. Not me. I am not ready to die; until I can afford it! What guarantees are there that in death, I will gift them freedom rather than another kind of wrong? Remember Uhuru? Kenyatta won independence, the freedom that is the privilege of only Pigs at this farm. Dedan Kimathi won Dependence. Dependence on a black Feudal Lord rather than a white one for that quarter inch of squatter space. Uhuru for Kimathi and his issue was, in the end having ‘one of our own’ at Governor’s Mansion. Uhuru was having a fellow black man ride your back and letting you call him Bwana.
I am not ready to die for this cause, that cause, no cause. I am no youth for hire. Yes I am a lone voice in the wilderness and yes I said “Prepare”. But I never said prepare for one that is greater than me. I baptize you with THC and wood alcohol because it pays me. But if Herod were to have my head on a Kalu Works sufuria, you will want to call me Martyr; Father of the Revolution. Too stupid you will remain not even able to see the real gift in my death- sobriety. But you always chose the inebriate path to empty- perpetually drank on rhetoric and hero worship. The smart ones amongst you will at least make T- shirts with my image on them. Take you for your last 3 soc, and not give royalties to my mother.
But Herod; Herod will march on. Herod and or his seed, thereafter.
It is vanity, says the Potash, your labour is vanity.
What profit has a man from all his labour in which he toils under the sun?
One generation passes away, and another generation comes;
But the earth abides for ever.
(Eccle; Chap. 1)
No greater love hath any man for his life than this. I wouldn’t give my life for seventy seven virgins, everlasting life or such other arcane pursuits of a dogmatic punishment/ reward equation. In my book Martyrs don’t live (They dead see?) Death is a negation of the joy of living; and martyrdom its defilement. I desire to live. Live so well that maybe in death I will have found a fawning band and consequently, a resurrection. I want to walk; even though I walk as Barnabas or that there Dinda.
Take a look at life’s ironies. They send you out as cannon fodder and you are lucky if you bring back a Purple Heart. For most there is nothing but a plaque at the grave of the Unknown Soldier, while others gain no more than an MIA after their names. Their folks cannot even honour their memories with a shallow grave,. And if they do, it is never too long before the private developer with his earth mover and luxury apartments takes a right royal piss on their parade. All that that soldier gets for giving his life for God and country is a ‘piss out Parade’. But the general, he returns home in an air- conditioned limo; retires to a political career illustrated with Government Defence Contracts.
Isn’t it ironic, that everyday kids are stopping strong bullets as they fight for ‘one of their own’ to put his itchy fingers in the till of some Harambee Avenue dukawala. Evidently, that is how Kenyatta saw it when he preached Harambee- that we all pool our meager resources together and give them to one fellow that he may advance himself. Because of Harambee and martyrs, Uhuru Kenyatta is worth 10 Million USD and Kimathi’s son- well did he have a son, who knows?- cannot even find his father’s grave to pour libation.
Kids die on these streets for tribal chiefs whose on children are out in England getting a quality education and fraternizing with the kind of women we cannot visualize beyond the images on the grainy VCDs at Kamwana’s Video Shack. Their children while away time waiting to return and take care of their father’s business, but you and I have nothing to return to. That Zero by Zero plot at the squatter settlement that you killed your brother for? When your daddy died at Mama Pima’s last July you never went to claim his body, you let the council dump him in a mass grave- ‘A Carcass for Hounds’. (You have nowhere to bury your dead.) Yet when that tribal chief dies, you will be at KICC for the Harambee. A Harambee to offset medical bills from Nairobi hospital all the way to a spa in Southern France. Then there is the matter of the good people ay Lee Funeral making him look like ‘a feast for the gods’- before the State Funeral.
I am no Martyr and unlike Bono, I have no Messianic Complex. I am not ready to die that children may be free. Free from what? This Quixotic existence of mine spent sitting on those stones, sipping on Napshizzle and Tilting at Windmills? Windmills that in turn become a government more rotten than gonorrheal pudenda. Not me. I am not ready to die; until I can afford it! What guarantees are there that in death, I will gift them freedom rather than another kind of wrong? Remember Uhuru? Kenyatta won independence, the freedom that is the privilege of only Pigs at this farm. Dedan Kimathi won Dependence. Dependence on a black Feudal Lord rather than a white one for that quarter inch of squatter space. Uhuru for Kimathi and his issue was, in the end having ‘one of our own’ at Governor’s Mansion. Uhuru was having a fellow black man ride your back and letting you call him Bwana.
I am not ready to die for this cause, that cause, no cause. I am no youth for hire. Yes I am a lone voice in the wilderness and yes I said “Prepare”. But I never said prepare for one that is greater than me. I baptize you with THC and wood alcohol because it pays me. But if Herod were to have my head on a Kalu Works sufuria, you will want to call me Martyr; Father of the Revolution. Too stupid you will remain not even able to see the real gift in my death- sobriety. But you always chose the inebriate path to empty- perpetually drank on rhetoric and hero worship. The smart ones amongst you will at least make T- shirts with my image on them. Take you for your last 3 soc, and not give royalties to my mother.
But Herod; Herod will march on. Herod and or his seed, thereafter.
It is vanity, says the Potash, your labour is vanity.
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