Hussein Afrah Sheengiyaale died in the dead of winter
Earth, receive an honored Somali guest
Hussein Afrah Sheengiyaale is laid to rest
In this alien snow
In this old cold exile
In this old cold Canada
In this our old cold “Lady of the Snows”
“O all the instruments agree
The day of his death was a dark old cold day”
Meanwhile
Back home
Where the humiliating hurt is
Where the clannish hate is
In the nightmare of our Somali old cold dark desperate dog days
All the yay
All the jackals feast on the carcass of Mandeq
All the clannish scavengers of Somalia bark
All the crazy clans cower & wait
Each sequestered in its hate
Woefully arrogant
Willfully ignorant
That today
An important Son of Somalia died
In old cold Canadian exile
That every day
Thousands of Somalia’s best & the brightest
Languish
In anguish
Shivering
In this old cold Canadian exile
Eating for breakfast
Every day
This old cold bitter Canadian cotton moldy bread of old cold Canadian exile
Mad Somalia drove Sheengiyale into this old cold Canadian exile
In the restaurant of Kamtiray
In the dead of a distant winter
I ran into him in Toronto
Incredulous
I remonstrated
Why?
Why are you here?
What are you doing here?
Don’t you know
That there are certain Somali trees that cannot be transplanted
Trees that perish when they are transplanted Hussein
Abti
You are one of those trees!
You don’t belong in old cold Canada
Where for half the year the trees are cold naked
Where for the other half of the year the people are buck naked!
You are not a maple tree
You are a gob tree
How you gonna cope in old cold Canada?
You are up an old cold Canadian tree!
You are out of your sunny Somali shady tree!
Why?
Why are you here?
What are you doing here?
How you gonna cope in this old cold Canadian exile?
—Abti
This abomination uprooted me
Out of my umma
Out of my Somali nation
It was right after the main Friday prayer
Barely outside of the main mosque of Mogadishu
When bullets barked
Bang!
Bang!
Bang!
The dead man was an elder about my age
The coon kaffir killer with his kalashnikov
Swaggered
À la John Wayne
To the fallen man
Took the Koran the dead man was still clutching
Took one hundred US out of the Koran
Drop-kicked the Koran into the crowd
That was still coming out of the mosque
And walked away with an arrogant ignorant impunity
With his nose up in the air
Like one of those camels he used to herd
In the benighted bush
Where he was yesterday a camel jockey
That abomination
That sacrilege
Decided me
To cut out
To quit
What was once our country
What was once our second mother
What was once our motherland
What was once our Somalia
What was once our home
What was once Heaven’s junior sister
Where once the Holy Presence of Allah was most palpable
Where now Allah has withdrawn His Holy Presence from
Where even now the very trees are on hunger strike
Screaming
For visas
Out of hellish Hutu Hawiyeland
Out of the moriyan mad murderous mess of Mogadishu
O all the instruments agree
The day of Sheengiyaale’s death was a dark old cold day
Allah, receive now the returned soul of your slave
Hussein Afrah Sheengiyaale
May he now rest
Basking
In the home of your Holy Presence
May he drink now
His fill of bliss
From Al Kawthar
From the river of abundance
In that Paradise
That you had bestowed
Upon our Prophet Muhammad
Upon his Umma.
May peace be now upon our Prophet.
May peace be now Upon Sheengiyaale.
