While my buddies bounced at
the back of bluebonnet Ford
Slamming shut their uncle’s
yellow-door Ford
I ducked bursting spooky seed-coats
Teachers mistook my gnashing teeth
for a smile
We didn’t own a two-wheeled Toyota
I gulped throat-aching sour milk
and snoozed on boxes mattress
Snooping to the squeaking bed’s lullaby
The stabbing diamond mesh tickling
my ribs Caretakers mistook my
shaking head for a No?
With a rubber, I wiped my torturing yesterday
The wind swishing my cracking heels
and the sunbow televising the fluid-filled bubbles on my feet
With a white stripe grey blanket, I shielded my face from a bully called tomorrow
I gathered green and yellow scraps of soaps-
and built a brick-size soap
A rosemary scented soap that
lasted me a semester
I hitchhike embaku-mbaku, but
the orange overall driver
snubbed my plopping teardrops
Like a loafing teacher,
he graded the white crushed stones zero out of ten
That was before sliced bread
Everything changed when
Santa-Stephen gifted me his school uniform
A pair of black Kiwi shoes,
a grey short
purplish blue shirt
with knee-shy grey socks
And cut me pangaa style with a rattling
manual hair clipper
Finally, Nana picked me in a pony-pulled Mazda
* pangaa – buddy
embakumbaku- grader