Category Archives: Slice of Creativity
Let’s Ride
Smooth hazelnut with a splash of vanilla – beneath me I could feel her strength and the direction in which she pricked her ears told me when I had wronged her.
She took me, yet I remained in control; I guided despite her being in the lead. I moved to her rhythm until we were comfortable to dance in time to the same beat.
Free.
In the great expanse of golden grains and rocks; amongst the load men of old had placed one upon the other; within the vicinity of the chambers of men who thought they’d never die, we ran and laughed with the winds competing against us in the opposite direction.
In a moment of stillness we touched, the melted chocolate of her gaze swirled within the darkness of mine and a tear fell. My apology had hastened itself despite me not releasing it from the entrapment of my throat. I placed a hand on her head, gently pushing aside the strands that had fallen between her eyes and rested lazily along the length of her nose.
She told me of how she’d been whipped, made to perform above the ability God had bestowed upon her, and kicked when her underbelly was plump with the swelling of a new life-form. She once resisted against me, thinking we were all the same: takers who gave nothing in return. But I stroked her, whispered to her, and refused to use the lash.
Standing unshaded in an expanse of nothingness, I professed my love for her, and she said for the final time, ‘Come, my love, hold my reins – let’s ride’.
– The Londoner
Them & Us
The two camps were quite obvious: ‘them‘ and ‘us‘.
Them consisted of children playing bare-footed, clothes slightly grubby, young girls wearing over-sized earrings and handmade necklaces that reached down way past their flat chest. Dirt-stained faces and brown-stained teeth, with guys strutting around in ship-ships (flip-flops).
Us consisted of tweezer-perfected eyebrows, designer shades, degree-holders and bright smiles. Name-branded attire, some sort of grasp of the English language, and refusal for the kids to play with their’s.
The feast was amazing; it was an ensemble of rice, pastries, pizza, samboosa, cannelloni and shipsi. They looked on, as they knew they couldn’t get a share, and we didn’t even think to share. Their necks were stretched for a better view as they watched us eating from afar – just a few yards away, in reality.
Maybe that’s the way things are. Maybe that’s the way things have to be. Or is it?
The food was in abundance, and there were only 30 of us. There was more than enough to go around for them too; in actual fact, the leftovers could have been given to them, even if it was nothing but an afterthought. I’m sure it would’ve been accepted. But who am I to speak? I am the outsider, and what right does an outsider have to question the way of the people?
Nevertheless, the park isn’t for us alone, nor for them exclusively – it is for all: us, them, the birds and the insects too. Yet, right there, by the Nile that unites so much more than people, there was a clear sight of the two groups, each firm in their camp – on their side.
I guess… that’s the way things are and will be.
– The Londoner