The Soultown! Volume III: Issue 8 AUGUST 2019 | Page 23

THE GRIOT Solomon Mihoro’s Refugee Camp Song What is all this about anyway? Like J. Alfred Prufrock, I will say, “Oh, do not ask, ‘What is it?’” You’ve gone too many times for too long. I ma not Othello, was not meant to be. Nor do I want to drown into Lake Kivu-- Too many bloated corpses therein and Ongoing massive massacres in Rwanda suffice -- I am going to stay out of your valley and Let your mountaintop alone until we meet Again in afterlife. Going to stay out of your valley and Let your mountaintop alone until we meet Again in afterlife. NOTE TO THE EDITORS: “Solomon Mihoro’s Refugee Camp Song” is a prequel to “I Wish I Could Sing of ‘the Sweetest Years” (The Soultown, April 2019) and Signifies on/rewrites a chapter in The Song of Songs--the last poem in the trilogy is ready for July issue--Besides my dad Bisama, who was a diviner and a medicine man, the poem celebrates African (Sebatunzi, Koffi Olomide, Papa Wemba (Wembadio) and African American artists (Robert Johnson, Billie Holiday, Langston Hughes, Trey Songz), Shakespeare, and T.S. Eliot. Ultimately, the poem recounts the story of marriage and love gone wrong during the Rwandan Refugee Crisis in 1994, as millions of Rwandans fled into Zaïre, fearing reprisals from the Rwandan Patriotic Front. DR. PIERRE MVUYEKURE The Griot ________ Learn more from The Griot at: http://www.thesoultown. com/the-griot.html Email Me: pierre. [email protected] I am Dr. Pierre Mvuyekure, Griot for The Soultown International Magazine. I’d like to thank the African storytellers for having SOUL! , https://bit.ly/2GnNtlX HA PART 2 I sought her but I did not find her Whom my heart loves. I called out to her, but she did not answer me. When I find her, Uwanjye, Whom my heart loves, I will hold her and not let her go Till I tell her whom my heart loves: Uwanjye, You are my sachet of East African myrrh, my cluster of henna. Are you still an enclosed garden, a fountain sealed? Uracyari inkongoro ya Dede Inywerwamo na Dede wenyine? Are you still solely Dede’s milk pot? Like Billie, I will say: Nka Holiday nzamubwira nti: “Hush now, don’t explain.” Inumire, wisobanura. Bisama told me you will be my delight and sorrow. Said you will make me feel like having a heart attack. Ngo uzatuma mera nkaho ndwaye umutima. All passion, pleasure, and pain. Uwanjye, whom my heart loves will ask, Aug. 2019 • The Soultown International Magazine • Celebrating 2 years • Connecting Our Cultures to Our Cyber & Conscious Communities • thesoultown.com 23