TWEEDLEDUM & TWEEDLEDEE:
THE HIRAAB BROTHERS
Tweedledum and Tweedledee
Agreed to have a battle;
For Tweedledum said Tweedledee
Had spoiled his nice new rattle.
Just then flew down a monstrous crow,
As black as a tar barrel;
Which frightened both heroes so,
They quite forgot their quarrel.
The Abgal braves
Or
The Ali Baysten yay
The mindless mob
As their foes call them
Held a powwow
&
Worked themselves into a furious fine frenzy
&
Demanded
That their Eemaan,
Their leader curse them
Out of humanity
Out of being the Sons of Adam
Out of being the Sages of Somalis
The Abgal Eemaan said
My clansmen
I can’t
I won’t
I don’t know
How to do that
How to curse you
How to cast imprecations upon you
I only know
How to bless you
O my clansmen
Why would you want me to curse you?
Then the Ali Baysten replied
Because we want to be like our brothers
The Habar Kintir
The reason why our brothers
The Habar Kintir are
Such mendacious manipulators
Such natural born killers
Such heroes
Such merciless Cains
Such Niman Bellaya
Such men of disaster
Such ignorant arrogant Dr. Know-it-alls
Such mindless men of mugdi Mudug
Such blind mouths
Is that
They have no Emaan!
They have no Faith!
Whereas we the Abgal
Have only Faith & nothing else!
As we all know
Before the advent of the Macavity Majerten
In Mogadishu
We had no issue
We used to feast lying down
Reclining like the Romans
Then the Macavity Majerten came
A-begging
Meowing for our Mohog in Mog
We sat up to protect what was ours from the Macavity Majerten!
Nevertheless
The Macavity Majerten bested us
For in the fifties
&
In the sixties
We had accepted
The bliss
&
The blessing of the Fatiha from them
Try that
On our brothers
The Habar Kintir
&
Then they will answer you
Before they kill you
Please don’t bother us
Stick your Fatiha into you fat fanny!
Make that cash!
We only accept cash!
Money talks
Bullshit like the Fatiha walks!
Take your Fatiha
To the Ali Baysten
To my brothers!
To the foolish Abgal!
Before the Il-Jeh came to invade our tribal territory
We used to feast sitting down!
Like civilized folks
Now that the Habar Kintir had stolen our birthright
We have nothing to eat!
We are always
On the go
On the run
Crazy on kat
Caught in the rat race
Like the crazy Yankees
Gulping down fast flavourless flatulent food
Emaan!
That is why
We want to be natural born killers
Like our brothers
We want to be like the Il-Jeh!
You say
That you don’t know
How to curse us
Curse us like this
So we can become like our brothers
The Habar Kintir
Curse us the way our ancestor
Hawiye
Had cursed the Il-Jeh!
Curse us with these three calamities
That he had cursed them with!
A stomach
That is as insatiable
As the seven bellies of the unbeliever!
A tongue
A forked tongue
Like the ofay’s
That calls his lies Manifest Destiny & other Doozies!
That calls peace war & war peace!
That never ceases wagging!
That is never embarrassed!
That is never ashamed!
That is never abashed!
That is never shy!
That is always so glib
That is ever so deceitful
A foot
That never ceases
Committing murder & mayhem
Committing black mischief!
Curse us
So we will lose our unshakable Faith
In Allah!
In Islam!
In each other
In everything decent
Curse us
So we will inspire Fear in each of us instead of Faith!
Curse us
So we will like the Il-Jeh be blind guides
Who strain at a gnat and swallow a Somali camel whole!
Curse us
So we will take the children’s bread and cast it to dogs!
Curse us
So Allah will cast us out into the outer darkness of hell!
Curse us
So that in Mogadishu there will be
Ceaseless weeping!
Ceaseless anguish!
Ceaseless languishing!
Ceaseless gnashing of teeth!
Ceaseless murder!
Ceaseless mayhem!
Ceaseless madness!
Curse us
So we will lose like the Il-Jeh our own soul
But gain mad Mogadishu!
But bask in Perdition
But Bask in Pandemonium
The high capital of Satan & his peers
Curse us
So that our leaders will be false prophets & ravening wolves!
Curse us
So that the Somali house will become
A house divided against itself that cannot stand!
A house built on the quicksand of clanism
A house divided into
Darod against Hawiye
Darod against Darod!
Abgal against Abgal!
Il-Jeh against Il-Jeh!
A house divided into
Brother against brother!
Sister against sister!
North against South!
Hargaysa against Mogadishu!
Curse us
So we devour the orphan’s share & the widow’s houses!
And for pretense make long prayers
&
Grow black shivering fearsome beards!
Like Osama’s
Curse us
So we love darkness rather than the light!
Curse us
So we hate each other!
Curse us
So we love and adore
Whatsoever things are crazy
Whatsoever things are clannish
Whatsoever things are clownish
Whatsoever things are coonish
Whatsoever things are false!
Whatsoever things are fake
Whatsoever things are vain
Whatsoever things are fatude
Whatsoever things are fanfaronade
Whatsoever things are dishonest!
Whatsoever things are indecent
Whatsoever things are impure!
Whatsoever things are fugly!
Whatsoever things are of evil report!
Curse us
So we can shut up our bowels of compassion
Against the needless suffering of our neighbours!
Curse us
So we do the bidding of our enemies
The bidding of the Ethiopians & the Kenyans
When the Emaan refused to curse his Abgal clan
The Abgal crucified him
Becoming
As acephalous
As headless
As heedless
As asinine
As their brothers
As the Habar Kintir
Raising one among themselves by merit to his bad eminence
One devoid of decency & dignity & integrity
One very much like Aideed
One marked like Aideed
One called
Ali Mahdi
Or
Ali Nafto!
Or
Ali Diesel!
Who is Ali Mahdi
In Togane’s Apocrypha
One day
They brought Jesus
They brought The Word of Allah
They brought The Spirit of Allah
A leper
Jesus healed the leper
Jesus cleansed the leper
They brought Jesus a blind man
Jesus restored sight to his eyes
They brought Jesus a man who could not hear
Jesus opened his ears!
They brought Jesus a man who was lame
Jesus made him walk
They brought Jesus a man possessed
By Jinni
By devils
Jesus cast them out and restored him to sanity
They brought Jesus a dumb man possessed by the devil
Jesus rebuked that devil out of the man and the man spoke!
They brought Jesus
The Son of Mary
A dead man
Jesus resurrected him
Jesus raised him up from the dead!
And then they brought Jesus
Ali Mahdi
Ali Nafto
Ali Diesel
Chief ass
Chief donkey
Of the Abgal Donkeydom!
Of the Abgal Donnybrook!
That is when Jesus wept!
Saying even the Son of Man
Even the Son of Mary
Even the prophets of Allah are helpless
When faced with fools like Ali Mahdi!
For as Somalis themselves say
Never help a fool
Never heal a chucklehead!
That is why today the Abgal are called
Habar Koolay!
For they have indeed become what they had wanted to become
Just like their brothers called
Habar Kintir!
Whom God wishes to destroy, He first makes them
Mad as Aideed & his Habar Kintir!
Whom God wishes to destroy, He first makes them
Asinine as Ali Mahdi & his Habar Koolay!
That is why today Somalia
Is seesawing
Is swinging
Between Habar Kintir & Habar Koolay!
Between Tweedledum & Tweedledee!
Between Ali Diesel & Aideed!
Between Folly & Lunacy!
Between Arabs & Africans!
Between the Devil & the Deep Blue Sea!
Between Scylla & Charybdis!
Between Gog & Magog!
Between Jooj & Wamajooj!
Between Arta Djibouti & Eldoret Kenya!
