When I heard of the burning tires, black fists clenched in hate of one another, my heart raced with fear.
My mom’s a different tribe. Living in the backyard of this eruption, will they see she’s different too? My mind raced with images of a smoke-filled, blood-spilled Johannesburg. Spaces once filled with cars now filled with the faceless anger, spears up, boots down, crunching towards amakwerekwere. The dawn will not come.
Their appetites whetted with the kill, kill, kill. Nostrils flare as the smell of crisp flesh surges them ahead. Flames dance in my brother’s eyes. The stars twice removed shine on to the bitter dawn. Somewhere across space and time, white faces ask me, “What have your people done?” and I can say nothing. How can I? I wasn’t even there.
But I remember. I remember thinking how have we come to this? I remember calling and getting no answer. I remember not sleeping, reading foreign newspapers, watching my country fall apart. I remember wanting to come home just to see if my country was still the same. I remember landing and looking at all the familiar sites, like a mother checking for scars on her baby. I saw none.
The air felt the same. There was no sign of terror. No marks left by the force. Someone erased this story. I remember looking at the mountain, hoping not to forget.
They say it was the perfect storm.
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