Routine Drugs I—For Eldred Jones
By Ama Ata Aidoo
They had asked me—
a worthy friend and
a loving brother—
to “stop shouldering
the world’s troubles,”
—one meaning Africa,
the other women—
“learn to
laugh and
live!”
I grow hot:
thinking that
laughing?
That’s easy:
it’s all we do instead of
crying.
And since there’s
so much to cry about
we laugh and
laugh and
laugh.
But
living?
You could tell them
that’s not easy.
In a real life
in a real world
perhaps.
But here
where
on a bare belly
for less than a cedi,
you gathered
in single pieces and
carried
ten bushels of
solid stones
your four-month-old baby
straddled on
your back,
slipped,
fell
broke your
arm—?
Laughing we do for
fear of
crying.
Living
we don’t discuss
here.
Copyright © by the owner.
