EXILE I

Every one is born a king, and most people die in exile, like most kings.

—Oscar Wilde

Now it is

My thirty-first

Season of sorrow

My thirty-first

Season of my sad exile

Since I have been eating this cold bitter bread of exile

Since I had run away

From home

From my kingdom by the sea

From Somalia

From Mighty Mouth’s cruel laughter

From Marehan-Ogaden-Dhulbahante Afwayneland

From dirty Darodland

From Hutu Hawiyeland

From Mindless Mugdi Mudug

From Ee-door Hargayse Whoredom

Like a latter-day coon slave

To Canada

To a land kinder than home

Which I believed

Belonged

To John F. Kennedy

When this Mennonite missionary teacher

When this Merlin Russell Grove

When this beloved brother

Driven

From his fat farm

In Markham, Ontario

By this Great Love

By this Great Commission

By this

“Go ye therefore & preach

The gospel

To every creature…”

Hounded me

In Mahaddei Wayn

In the Somali benighted bush

For Heaven

By laying down his life

Like his Lord

For me

For Somalis.

EXILE11

Oh, to be in Somalia

Now that it is

That time of year

Here in Montreal

When the marrow freezes in my bones

When my ebon skin looks ashy white

Dried for death

When flu alien ailments

Blow in

From Hong Kong

From bang-bang Bangcock

From Futo-ba-eed

From Oryx’s Fanny.

Oh, to be home in Mogadishu

By the Lido Bay

Where there is

No

Wet

White

Cold

Snow

Falling

From the heavens

Numbing everything below.

Home

By the Lido Beach

Where I’d dive

Deep

Hidden

For a spell

From the sultry Somali sun

And

In the calm cool depths of the Indian Ocean

Startle

Schools of stampeding fish

And

Frolic

And

Fly

With the flying stingrays.