Aker: Futuristically Ancient

SAMBURU ‘My People”

We are travellers
We carry our names
With the beat on our feet
Re Barolong, Bakoena, Batlhaping,
Bahlakwana le Bakgatla
We are Samburu north butterfly

I stand on the backs
Of those who are called Bakganka
Singing songs that the rains and the winds
Never whispered to dinoka.
Badimo baka waiting to be praised
With the buzz of the bees,
The beats of the drums
They chant to my unsaid choruses.
I stride on shoes of giants,
Creating the legacy of their conquest,
Embracing their names in verse,
Reflecting their voluptuous looks on lakes,
Pulling their strings from Khalagadi,
Placing them on borwa ba AFRICA

Tshika ngwe ya rona comes from the reeds
They have built Maluti Mountains with their hands
Beautifully, engraved their narrations on sunburnt hills
Leaving their birthmarks on olive caves

We are Samburu north butterflies
Glittering with diamonds attached to our wings
Living after ancient tales,
Our souls are wrapped
In long wedding shawls,
We the wise ones speaking in riddles,
Where our words pass through
Village gossips, metaphors,
Our lands marked by chocolate pebbles
And pale skies
These lands where warriors glide
Effortlessly over rocks.
Striding easily across long life distances

My people have placed graves of their Kings
On top of Thaba Bosiu
They have shaped thorns
To protect their languages
Allowed their spears to rise in anticipation
To create the intimate magic.

And in the night of wisdom,
We sing in puzzles
We come out of our cocoon like little babies covered with life,
We jump like butterflies that have reached their glory,
Our sounds, travel far on the still air
Of story telling and spell dances.
We sleep with darkness calling our names.

At dawn the rays of the rising sun
Kiss our lips
As Virgo the morning stars make out our names

We are Samburu north butterflies
Stringing cords from our ancestors’ guitars
Moving with songs of time
As the meadow carries our fairy-tales
Reitea Kosha, retswa ka pina
As the forest echoes our clan names.
Our tongues recite clicking sounds of the desert
We the Sand people
Constantly in search of the grazing sun
Our red veins mark the soil
The spilt blood of our warrior-ship
Dances with the safari snakes

We are Samburu north butterflies
Our roots are rooted in Leole Mountains
We are calling out Thobela Sekhukhune
Mampuru Mopedi Moholo
Moshoeshoe moshoashoailana
Re Barolong, Bakoena, Batlhaping, Bahlakwana le Bakgatla
Hotswa mosi oya thunya
Re Bo Mankurwane le Bo Manthatisi
We are merely travellers
Carrying our names
With the beat on our feet
We chant and chant Freedom

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