Poem: In My Mother Tongue

In my mother tongue

by Keren-Happuch Garba

I sang the songs my own mother taught me

In the language of her tongue

With the rhythm of zephyr thrumming through grass blades

And the mixture of plucked leaves sifting through warm winds

Arranged in packets of supple tunes.

I sang my-mother-taught-songs with the rain

And beats made by the sounds of dew kneeling into hay

Bending afresh those dried sinews to soft buds.

I sing a tuneless song of my mother tongue

One that is shaped in the language of sadness

And told in the name of the burning earth.

The rain has hidden

Dew has no name under the conflagrating skies

The sky pulses an elegy for the earth

Who has now buried itself in a shallow ditch

Then resurrects at the taste of our sweat hitting its dear back.

We sing the songs brought to us by the earth

In the language of her mourning and the breaths she died with

We hope the sky listens

That the rain may find its path at the tips of our tongues.

Keren-Happuch Garba is a creative writer published in Write the World Review, Cathartic literary magazine, Gaia lit and elsewhere. She enjoys reading, writing and being adventurous.

Find her on Instagram @kerenhappuchgarba.