Tonya
At nineteen she’s beautiful—
chic and slim
Legs as smooth as a king’s javelin
She’s gentle in her speech, like the flow of a stream
With a face, the glamour of a cloudless skyline
She wears the sexiest of silk garments
And the finest of beads in the world of ornaments
We gape at her from the backyard fence
And wish we could ever afford her bride price.
But Tonya is not your ordinary character
She lives in the farthest of distant worlds
With a book on her lap she travels Miles
Dating and flirting with invisible ghosts
Sometimes she smiles as she reads, we wonder!
Who talks to books? We ask in surprise
She raises her eyebrow, distracted and irritated
She shakes her head and shuts her book.
Her father is an old man of few words
A chief ever scorning the white man’s books
He drinks his wine and plays his harp
He sings his songs of the battles he fought
Her mother is the youngest of the chief’s wives
A remarkable diviner with an air of romance
She speaks highly of Tonya and the chief is provoked
‘That pair of pumpkin heads fool of books!’
@Asiimwe Simon
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