the long drive.

begins early and with a circle that takes us from the beginning and back and then onto the true route.

the city is not yet awake but working towards day.

so much anticipation. i watch out the windows and am impressed by the beauty. invisible tears stream down my eyes. 

in me builds a sense of numbness but over extraordinary sensation.

to see such death and life dancing together along the roadside like old lovers who have never lost the new love smell. seated neatly in the pain of destruction and hopeful rebuilt.

the road is long and often unkempt. sleeping stretches marked in time by the length of proper paved and pot holes. silences fill most of the unused space. 

small town later we eat and watch how the night’s previous rain has overtaken the streets and created a confusion in the cars. people moving and yet entirely motionless.

to be free of that chaos…and on to the next version. 

a smile upon arrival. two new little friends. braided hair and precious fotos.

a lone horse. and missed sunset.

villages spot the region coming out of the flat where you can see for miles through forever forest. there are huts and numerous bovine.

I stayed in my own hut with a very large bed and other luxuries of western living.

we tread on the road off the road up and down in and out next to and upon the dirt, an adventurous route, to a less than adventurous meeting.

people scatter the sides in the shade of trees that will hold no leaves come november waiting for rides or passerbys who may take interest in their wares.

sky is endless blue and clouds give the illusion of mountains, as if to casually remind me that somehow i’m not far from home.

cool african breeze. rare.  almost more appreciated than water.

everyone in variations of slick shine. soft circle of conversation debate decision. important things regarding the declaration.

the other day,  rooms were changed from large and spacious to small and cramped solely to take advantage of better cooling mechanisms, and thankfully so.

refuge today, now found in a strange abandoned hexagon.

words fly. sudden lift of bodies out of chairs and through the doors.

time to make the trek back to the other town. some of us ride in the back of the truck.

a side stop that lasts for hours after the brief afterlunchtime lunch meal. 

i wait outside and watch an electric orange bird build a nest, watch the moon rise, watch the village go from dead to alive, watch numerous people stroll past, watch my head fall with heavy. we’ve lost two of our party to the length of the errand. i learn about famous senegalese singers and tell of differences between countries. 

my names are tossed about erratically sometimes the one i was given at birth, sometimes the one they’ve adopted to me. both to which i respond.

he asks me to help. i do. he tells me to eat so I become as big as a large building. i laugh. they ask me to tell a little story.  i try.

the moon is out full force with slight cloud cover.

we all enjoy the mixed tongues. Dou dou dou and nyum nyum. 

the polaar word for bravo, choum…and in double time, burn.

thirty mosquito bites later with numb feet and other swollen extremities.

playful exhaustion and well needed sleep.

my first mission.