I hate my house 

I don’t trust my mouth, I only have a tone stitched and tainted trouser, I’m starving 

No difference between me and a church mouse 

My spouse left me 

I get money if I beg 

I feel pain in my leg 

My life is at stake, it’s like a cloth hanging on the peg.

Paper boards written on different items

You can tell by seeing them

Carrots, tomatoes, sugarcane Everything you want I got it 

I also have some extraordinary gauge 

My prices are favourable to every client 

You’re most welcome

The voice emptied of love 

Only Occupied with hate 

A complaint from a charcoal seller 

Catch for me that little bastard Stealing my falling wood 

A police man with a gun 

A desperate teen looking for a living 

Hands that slip into the customer’s pocket caught red handed 

Handcuffs disciplining his hands 

People around breathing ruthlessly, cursing and accusing 

No point of return, left dispirited 

And stranded it’s not hard to tell 

That he has started picturing his way 

To jail and I doubt he’ll ever get any bail.

Voices, voices, choices, choices 

It’s like a lesson with no curriculum   

Life differs like pages in the book

Let me change to another chapter 

I see no rapture in this 

Better capture the letters and know at least what they mean.

BY OBED SHYAKA