Sonnets

Context — Nobody has a simple story.

30.
“At home,” Abu began, “I’m one of eight.
My parents heard their cousin’s sister’s niece
was near to an inherited estate,
as diabetes hit. Her man, obese,
was ousted from his title to the land,
my family was left in foreignness
of Tanzania, food and home unplanned.
Imagine,” he continued, “sore in this
is me, forgotten as my family coped
by squatting on some land and planting crops,
subsistence eked out on a plot that sloped
so much your standing view was of treetops
the next plot over. But they still upheld
the family honor, as they felt compelled.