We gave up on her,
no her ways.
she would cry for no reason
and scare us with unprovoked laughter
she will embrace us all in the morning,
drive us all insane before noon
make peace by dusk
and make our beds on the roof before midnight
this Yaa
she is moody at funerals
and stoic at festivals
we skirt around her temper on egg shells
but we swear shes forgettable.
her dark brown face and blank eyes
the lost look in them loses us and drowns us
we don't remember the mounds that are her lips
we don't look at her much
this Yaa
Yaa the earth goddess
a cold barren land this one
brown sprouts, salty springs and angry mountains
she bears stale fruits and thorny weeds.
she has no bosom our Yaa
her children will drown before she receives another tear
from her runaway lover - the sky
she has baffled the wisest
and smothered the bravest
Yaa of the restless soul,
those who stay long enough know shes troubled
we watched her burn forests
trying to warm up to us
we watched her lover smite her,
his fiery temper and cold love-making
cracked her skin into tortoise shells.
we looked on indifferently
while her children hurt her and neighbors abused her.
our intervention?
we sing of her peculiar ways in the markets.
