ODE: "AT LEAST RESPECT HIM" BY BLESSING S. CHIGUNDA

Listening to the discordant hums of disorganized pregnant soilders.

Buzzing in a distracting fashion 

closely at his chill-bitten ears.

Weightlessly they land at his body 

inject their siphoning cable.

Illegally mining the oil from his veins and arteries.

While he was toothpiking

the eyes of dried capenta 

off his soot tinctured teeth,

Standing at absurd staggering attention( caused by storming blows of villains who attacked him weeks ago while he was at work)

Excruciating bitter mottled pain

exerted by mosquitos and frowning weather 

caused him to retaliate,

as he slap his bitten sore beardless rough cheek,

Which he mowed with a blunt razor blade.

The loaded tank of the illegal miners,

got punctured by as they got compressed 

against the studded cheek of this war veteran.

At his house he leave behind two kids,

a wife who depended partly on him,

As well as a swarm of loitering homeless mosquitoes depends on him.

His sergeant regularly check him,

Find him snoring and fast asleep.

Threats for terminating his contract ensued,

If this happen again.

The sergeant leaves.

After ordering him not to dare entertain drowsiness,

Off he goes to that security officer's house.

To do the unmentionable,

With the war veteran's wife.

Like a stripper she madly rock the sergeant's middle leg.

She was on night shift as well.

As the dawn approach 

After brutal massacres of mosquitoes,

With hands tinged with blood,that was stolen from various night victims,

he washed them on the crawling sewage which like a wounded serpent hide itself into his guardroom.

His sore chin

Circumcised by the boisterous blade of whispering wind.

His fingers mutilated by the machete of harsh weather.

His teeth chatter,

Lips involuntarily slap each other.

What a sad story.

During the day

He sell chopped firewood

To make ends meet.

As sole reliance on the pittance he get couldn't sustain his family.

He is a man.

A man riddled with loads of sorrow.

Plagued with equations

Which he couldn't calculate.

BLESSING S CHIGUNDA

18:57

04/07/23

- Zimbabwe

The poet persona accounts all the physical and emotional pains that masculine soldiers face. The voice gives that male soldiers should be respected for their courage towards the harshness of their job's nature. Are women not also in the soldiering careeer?