Rendezvous in Bilad-as-Sudan - poem

African American Review, Winter, 1993 by Bill Keith

that delirious summer in africa we met in dakar senegal

o black pearl of africa lonely wayfarers we were

parched & thirsty for togetherness as i sat hypnotized in a street cafe & watched the slow procession like stately giraffes of ebony-hued & onyx-eyed wolof women in gaily colored boubous you appeared a mandinka apparition o isis of my dislocation o oracle of my 500 years of yearning

what ancient majestic sculptor chiseled the antique fragility of your sable face was it your limpid seagreen eyes

or your siren lips that summoned me

a mummified & worldweary osiris

to caravan across thousands of nautical miles

& centuries of cultures

to rendezvous with you in bilad-as-sudan

my long lost blood soul sister as we strolled on the corniche to sembioudoune

where the atlantic

was the color of a bluejay

griots gently thumbed calabash koras & sang old african songs that soothed my westernized mind enmeshed in the filigree web of delirium the tick of time

was forgotten & jackals nibbled at our days

that unravelled like a broken string of pearls for a crown i gave you garland of waterlilies & hibiscus silently the hours scurried by on winged feet smitten we were oblivious of the camouflaged & khaki-uniformed soldiers with petite greaseguns tucked under their armpits a coup d'etat ended our revels & now steel fingers clutch my heart and in the far distance i hear a lost dove coo