I Know You From Somewhere
I have to be careful
to not trample the tender tips of creeping vines stretching onto my path.
It is taboo to walk over someone’s legs
so perhaps I should extend that same courtesy to this unnamed neighbour.
Unnamed because kahũrũra is too close to pumpkin and too far still from this vine –
my Kikuyu doesn’t extend wide enough
to cover this roadside ecosystem.
Unnamed, not unfamiliar.
Only a tongue unaccustomed to calling a castor plant instead,
mwarĩki.
A thought; perhaps terere tastes better than amaranth.
And the overgrown,
overlapping,
overzealous nettles in that ditch clamour for me to call them thabai and hatha.
Still, my tongue and lips,
My eyes and ears want to recognize the underbrush, copse and savannah
With names rooted in the same soils that we share.
