page 57

Rachel Sawaya

Bamako: Bud

The bar is an island,
under a sky of paper stars.
Red wood, beer and ash
smeared across the lacquer.
You buy another cold drink.
People crowd the seats
at the sides, sitting
in laps, on tables.
Music, music, talk.
Beats devour, cannibalise.
Only the strongest
survive. Throbbing
from head to head,
pushing onto the floor, into black people, white
people, people to people.
Dance a heady
kind of grey. You dance.

You’re no prize,
but music takes you
anyway. Some time
she is dancing
with you. Graceful,
she smiles
in a big way. Dark lips.
Your smile is pale,
you wait
for the punchline.

page 58

She buys you a Castel. Sips water and strokes your arm.
You draw a circle in spilled beer. I don’t have any money.
She touches your face. Money? Non.

Some time later,
you are kissing you are
kissing her she is
kissing you and you
are on the floor.
Above frames your girl,
thumping a man
who is shaking her
father? boyfriend?
hands wrap your arms,
pull slide across the floor.
Away from the fight.
You stumble up try to go back
hands hands everywhere
wrapping your chest,
your arms, pulling you
to the door,

you’re through the door.

This is not good, no girls kissing girls (kissing girls) in this place.
They don’t stop. But, they could kill her. They don’t stop.

Bottom of the stairs.
A knot of cigaretti-tigis
gather, the perfect excuse
to break away from those hands.
You defend your right
to Marlboro Reds,
then sneak-plunge, stumble
back to the door.

page 59

You see her
coming down
to you. Her eye
is bloody,
but she is unbowed.
She holds you,
her thumb pressed
on the tissue-paper
skin of your wrist
and kisses you again.
Cigaretti-tigis
approve.

Your friends let her
take you away. Fall
on the cracked
vinyl cab seat.

You wake
cool in morning air
and she is looking at you. Her eyes
are raw. Her cheek
presses against your nose.
Your tongue, her lips.
A dark meadow.
You pull off
the sequinned top.
Nipple flesh in
a folded labyrinth.
She pulls on your skin,
gentle pinches securing
her ascent, mouths
fast together.
You reach for the button and she stops you.

page 60

I’m sorry. You’re just so damn beautiful. Kneeling beside her.
There is a bad taste in your mouth. Probably the cigarettes.

She undoes the button,
undoes the zip
wriggles them down.
She is hairy,
and warm underneath.
For a moment
she is
perfectly yours.
Then she pulls back
the hood.

You wonder
if it is you she wants
or only a not-man.
For how could she want you.
For how could she want anyone.

Men never did this. My mother held me and my aunt
spread me wide to debris that fell from the ceiling as I screamed and an old woman
took the knife to me and spat in the dirt once it was done.

Bud torn away
only the stalk
remains

you cannot look
at what is not there.
Cannot touch.

There are women
who turn their penises
page 61 inside out to create room
for themselves.

Women cut off
their breasts
to retain life.

A gangrenous part
may be removed
by a loving mother.

She asks
and you show
her yours.

She dips fingers
into you and holds
them there look
this small thing
the tiny missing
part in all the pink
chaos it seems
like nothing at all.

Then she looks
into
your eyes.

Now it seems
like everything.