The Soultown! Volume III: Issue 10 OCTOBER 2019 | Page 23
THE GRIOT
A Master’s Degree Thesis Blues
Call me a Survivor. Ndi Uwarokotse.
I survived the Rwandan Geno/Cide.
The Rwandan Geno/Cide
Against Rwandans.
But I’m neither a Hutu nor a
Tutsi. Nor am I a Twa.
That’s for humans to be ethnic.
I am an M.A. Thesis titled
Ideals and Absolutes in Herman
Melville’s Fiction by
Mvuyekure Pierre-Damien,
Ruhengeri, Rwanda, June 1986.
My Pen Master left me in his
Mother’s house at Kirwa
Hilltop in Mugambazi County in
Buliza Region, Kigali Prefecture.
Mvuyekure Pierre-Damien, son of
Bisama Jean—Umupfumu a
Sorcerer according to Rutongo Parish
White Missionaries—and
Mukagatare Marie Thérèse—
a Medicine Woman Herbalist—Both
Root Doctors--
Left me for Buffalo on a Fulbright grant to
Study American Literature at SUNY Buffalo.
He left me in a brown box to mice,
Cock/roaches, book/worms, damp/ness,
War, Inkotanyi Tutsi fighters, Interahamwe
Hutu militia, Geno/Cide, Post/-Geno/Cide
Trauma.
Mvuyekure, my Pen Master, left me for a
Ph.D. in Buffalo, New York. Yaransize
Mvuyekure ngo agiye kwiga Dogitora i Buffalo.
Left me alone in lonely solitudes with/out a
Room of my own. I got so
Sorrow-stricken, jealousy-ridden
I wished him to swim in Niagara Falls for/ever.
I am a Survivor. Ndi Uwarokotse.
I survived the Rwandan Geno/Cide.
The Rwandan Geno/Cide
Against Rwandans.
But I’m neither a Hutu nor a
Tutsi. Nor am I a Twa.
That’s for humans to be ethnic.
I am an Umurera born in Murera region, in
Nyakinama County, south of the volcanoes, in
Ruhengeri Prefecture, in northern Rwanda,
near
Mukungwa River, on the Ruhengeri Campus of
Université Nationale du Rwanda—
Monsignor Georges-Henri Lévesque, a
Dominican from Quebec, founded it in 1963, a
year after
Rwanda recovered its Independence from
Belgium—
Dr. Bruce E. Fleming served as my
Literary “gynecologist”—Thesis Director—
Fulbright people sent him to the “jungle” with
Indemnités de brousse, special grants for living
in the
Bush of Rwanda. He enjoyed jogging and
visiting
Dian Fossey (a.k.a. Nyiramacibiri)’s Gorillas on
Karisoke Volcano—
They became Gorillas in the Mist.
Orphaned.
I am happier now but worried:
I now live in Ioway--the so-called
Hawkeye State--in Black Hawk County.
I once caught my Pen Master reading about
how
President Andrew Jaclson--
Founding Father of The Trail of Tears--’s
U.S. Army fired at Chief Black Hawk, even as
He was waving a white flag. They captured and
Imprisoned Chief Black Hawk in the East.
I once spied on my Pen Master:
He was reading an excerpt from
Black Hawk’s autobiography:
Life of Ma-ka-tai-me-she-kia-kiak, or Black
Hawk.
Gerald Vizenor calls this Native American
Survivance.
Survivability, according to Ray Young Bear, a
Meskwaki bard who specializes in “Word
Collecting.”
I, too, am a Survivor. Ndi Uwarokotse.
I survived the Rwandan Geno/Cide.
The Rwandan Geno/Cide
Against Rwandans.
But I’m neither a Hutu nor a
Tutsi. Nor am I a Twa.
That’s for humans to be ethnic.
I sleep and wake up in my Pen Master’s office
Atop Neo-HooDoo books by Ishmael Reed--
UncleIsh invented Neo-HooDoo Aesthetic
Based on African Vodun from Benin, Togo,
Ghana, Nigeria, and Congo--
One time Max Roach’s drums giggled and
proclaimed
JUMP TO PAGE 27
DR. PIERRE MVUYEKURE
The Griot
________
Learn more from
The Griot at:
http://www.thesoultown.com/the-griot.html
Email Me: [email protected]
Oct. 2019 • The Soultown International Magazine • Celebrating 2 years • Connecting Our Cultures to Our Cyber & Conscious Communities • thesoultown.com
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