She, I & Her

She looks young and smart, but she is bigger than herself,

She has an amazing smile, which makes everything seem alright,

She sees life from a bright side, and brighter she makes it herself,

She brings comfort to life, abiding in her any time is alright.

Her Latin name is Abril, like a flower symbolizing beauty and love,

She is generous and sincere like basil the herb, folks call her Xabbz,

Her charismatic and persuasive personality, inspires responsibility,

She often inspires tenderness in her shrewd, even when she ‘shrubs’.

I wait for a moment, to let know her mama what a daughter she’s got,

I wait for that momentous day, to let know ‘him’ that she’s all he’s got,

I wonder if she knows! Finding a friend in her means blessings in life,

I let know the world that she is in it to live, for she is so full of life.

She tells me I have a great future that I should hold on in there,

I say she has a greater future, and she should hang on in there,

She says that despite all, sad moments she will never forget,

I say that despite all, happy moments I will dare not forget.



-By Kosprin-

THE TOP SIX FOR THE TOP SEAT IN 2012;

With the media having hyped anxiety over 2012 (now March 2013) as the most important political year for Kenyans, several guys have already made their intentions clear that they will be seeking the top job. One of them will indeed become president but we all have our fears on what kind of presidency these peeps can demonstrate.

I am aware of Peter Keneth, Charity Ngilu, Raphael Tuju and Ole Kiyiapi's ambitions but there are all indications that they will not make it to the top six.

Mr. Wamalwa has always looked and sounded like a man who can make a very effective president. He is a good orator and a hard working member of parliament. He may not have political hair on his chest but who knows, he could pull a surprise as the next Obama for Kenya. He however needs to separate himself from his ethnic ill advised friends calling for Luhya unity and reach out to the  rest of Kenyans.

If elected in March, Mr. Kenyatta will be the first youthful president for Kenya. He could be the second professional president after Mr. Kibaki who will likely  expedite Kenya's economic growth ( I wonder if he still believes in his 2002 dream).

However, this man could turn out to be the bourgeois president who will create a man eat man society and possibly widen the gap between the poor and the rich like never seen before. In the past he has shown some character of arrogance and pugnacity and to this extent, he may turn out to be the most reactionary president just like his former boss in Kanu.

Mr.Odinga is perhaps the new president in waiting if what happened in 2007 and current opinion polls are anything to go by. Being a man who has lived half his life claiming for democracy and state house, he could be the most celebrated president just like Jomo in 1963. He could however turn out to be a “hands on” paranoid president who will succumb to any little pressure from the civil society and the international community.

If he doesn’t change his way of addressing crowds, he may turn out to be the most undignified head of state that everybody will want to ridicule and to this extent, the business community may not take him seriously. His overzealous attitude of wanting to lead the pack all the time may also put him in trouble with his experienced African counterparts.He is a loggerhead anyway.

If she ever makes it as president in March 2013, Ms. Karua will be the third lady president in Africa. Commonly known as the iron lady, she will certainly make women proud not only in Kenya but in Africa as a continent.

This lady could be the one to bring true change in Kenya owing to her no nonsense oomph towards issues of governance. She could however struggle to keep the economy on track since she has little skills and no experience on economic affairs.

Mr. Musyoka is well known for his miraculous declarations. It will indeed be a miracle if he ever becomes president for this country. If his declarations ever come true, the self declared clean diplomat and son of a poor man will be one of the most handsome presidents in the world. He could as well be given it on a silver platter by those who made him what he is today ( Kalonzo's political character and fate are more or less the same like Musalia Mudavadi's).   

Kalonzo will be an ordinary boring African president with no sense of humor just like his role model Mr. Kikwete of Tanzania. He could also turn out to be as arrogant as his former boss Mr. Moi. His dismissive attitude and hypocritical face of Mr. know it all will not do anybody any good.

Mr. Arap Samoei is also said to have ambitions of occupying the house on the hill come March. His popularity is purely built on controversy and chest thumping. If he ever becomes president, he will be a copy-cat of Mr. Moi who economically suffocated this country during his twenty four years reign. This man could turn out to be a viper and a political sadist who will scare friend and foe alike. Following his record in public life, he could be the most corrupt president who may not even be allowed to finish his first term in office.

You may therefore forgive me for believing that we may not have a president of Mr. Kibaki’s caliber any time soon. His maturity and composure are too much for any of the aforementioned presidential hopefuls to mantain. 

By Duke Kosprin

COMING FROM THE FUTURE;

My mother and I have always lived in our little suburb down the valley. I have lived without a farther for almost two and a half decades ever since my father deserted us. In our little house, there are only three portraits on the walls; my mother’s, mine and one for my mother’s little bulldog Gilberto who has been around since I was an infant. Gilberto never leaves the house except when he accompanies me for swimming at our neighbor’s house just across the fence.

I wouldn’t be swimming if it wasn’t for Miss Makena who encourages me. The pool belongs to her family and it was the last gift her father left them before leaving for Germany two and a half decades ago. Makena and never attended the same schools during our school days but she always played and did her homework with me at our house.

Even though our mothers rarely meet or even talk, the two of us hang around together most of the time. We swim together, read together and watch movies together. We often stroll down the valley together as she trains me how to play guitar. We later come back to my mother’s house and play piano. She likes my mother’s bulldog but she doesn’t quite like the idea that his name is Gilberto. She says her father is Gilberto too!-Gilberto Makena.

Just recently on the 15th October 2010, she had some good news to tell me; and so I went to meet her by the swimming pool accompanied by Gilberto. Minutes earlier, my mother had reminded me to take good care of Gilberto. We sat for a while by the pool as we reminisced our childhood. She then asked me to close my eyes for she had a gift she wanted to surprise me with. I obliged.

While I had my eyes closed, her gift accidentally fell into the deep waters of the pool. I then saw Gilberto diving into the waters for the gift. I knew he was not a good swimmer and that got me worried and confused. I thought about my mother’s advice earlier and immediately jumped into water to save him. I struggled in water but finally pushed Gilberto to the deep end. As Makena pulled him out, I was overwhelmed with excitement as a crawled back to the deep end.

In my excitement, I suddenly felt weak and my vision got blurred. I began sinking as I swallowed several gulps of water. I tried to call for help but I had no energy left. I finally lost my self completely and in my unconscious state, I saw what one can never see in any ordinary dream; I saw the future.

I saw myself in a holly cathedral in the city. On the wall clocks, it was exactly 9.00 am on Saturday the 15th day of October 2016. I was about 5.8 feet tall smartly dressed in a tight grayish French wedding suit. It was finally my wedding day with Miss Makena after having proposed to her six months earlier.

At the corridors, I grabbed my cell phone and ringed her just to psyche her up because we were only thirty minutes away from the hour. She expressed to me how she was excited that her father had traveled all the way from Germany for the wedding. I was happy for her.

I then made my short prayer and headed back to sit next to my mother at the left front bench which was set aside for us. My mother was extremely excited as she kept whispering to me how she was proud of me. Soon, we got an alert that the bride had arrived in the premises.

My best man, my mother and I stood at the front the basilica ready to receive the bride with her folks. I anxiously peeped through the windows and saw my beautiful princes in her white gown heading her way towards the main entrance.

When they approached the isle, the congregation was asked to arise as the bride jingle was played. She walked by her well groomed mother and father with her best lady right behind them. She focused her eyes on me brightened by her usual sweet smile. My mother who then had a firm grip of my right hand looked at me as if she was shocked. She embraced me as though she was collapsing. "Oh my God, Gilberto is her father?" That was all I heard from her before I found myself being resuscitated by Miss Makena who had just saved me from the pool.

By Duke Kosprin

ANXIETY RIDING ROUGHSHOD ON POOR ME;

"They say a solution to any problem first lies with the acknowledgment that you have a problem. For a while now, I have pretended that mine is no problem but a destined way of living. I might have lost a few friends but I am now more than ever determined to gain them back. I just hope they can understand what it means to have a super anxiety condition. 

Anxiety cracks my bones as I often contemplate of this thing called the future and what is bound to come out of me while I have my being. It’s nothing that you can call worry or compare to stress. It is a super anxiety that tears one down both physically and psychologically.

Enough of what it is but here is what has become of me as a result of this anxiety. I am hardly a quarter a century old but I almost feel twice as old as I am. As I calculate every single move in life, I do it with such extraordinary vigor that often exposes me as an eminent perfectionist.

A perfectionist it is; that is what I am and to a large extent" who I have become but certainly not who I ought to be. The anxious me finds it hard to relate with people of my age, leave alone those that are even younger. I hate a critic that I am; hardly does anything impress me.

I spend a lion’s share of my time grappling with my insecurity which like a rocking chair keeps me busy but gets me nowhere. My wild ambitions do not allow me to be easily tolerant. I am so quick at dismissing opinions that I consider irrational and I don’t find comfort in people who think they know it all.

Every time I act in any way less expected by me as a person of my perceived caliber, my moods get corrupted absolutely as guilt consumes me like the worst inferno you can imagine of. The bottom line in all these is my genuine desire to perfect the person in me that determines what I do and how I do it while I have my being.

I unfortunately do not belong to a category of many good people who can easily withstand embarrassment. This inspires a super careful and cautious character in me and any slight embarrassment literally begets a very pugnacious me. For this specific reason, I tend to avoid being a spontaneous person. I amply rehearse for expected situations and often postpone those that come abruptly.

My hard to impress psyche has no limit to anything worth my anxiety. Even for matters of the heart, I do not just absorb when it is not clear to me what the substance may make of me while I have my being. That is why it is hard, almost impossible for me to find it comfortable to settle down with any woman. It’s all for the fear of making a wrong choice.

No ordinary thing easily boggles my mind and therefore I opt to indulge in complicated staff. This explains why I bliss in being sophisticated satisfying my obsession for being different and above board.

People like me and paranoids often belong to the same school of thought. It is nothing to be proud of and I do not want to indulge in describing my dilemma further. Neither do I want to keep pandering on my doctors’ advice which is not working. All I need are friends who are willing to save me from myself." This is a story of a friend of mine.

THE MONKEYS' AMUSEMENT PARK;

Being a demure that I am, I love taking it easy by my house over the weekends. Nothing gives me pleasure than laying my back on my rocking chair facing the moon by the balcony with a glass of red wine as some soft Caribbean classic music hit waves from the background. I often diffuse the air with a delicious tight roll of tobacco leaves as I keep my eyes glued on some monkey business right in front of the balcony.

The chatter sounds from behind the palm and jacaranda trees are irresistible. As obnoxious as they are, monkeys are very interesting to watch. As they swing up and down the branches, one can tell how blissful they are and how much of a roller coaster that is to them. And they get excited when they notice they are being watched, that’s when they jump greater heights and swing more aggressively.

One noticeable thing is how they relate with each other as family and friends. I have more than once confirmed this by the way they gather around in groups before sun set. In their groups, it’s easy to notice that each group is a family. This is further confirmed by their physical appearance of similar distinctive features. The color of their tails and the amount of hair on their necks are some of the uniquely noticeable features.

The elderly monkeys are docile and stupidly so they keep roaming around chasing the little ones trying to have fun. On the contrary, the young ones are extremely energetic. You can’t help but notice how they run up and down trying to tune each other. Little female monkeys that have become of age are the most glamorous. They always stand by their asses at strategic points within the park looking stupid in their efforts to appeal to their male counterparts. That’s how they get to be chased around and interestingly so, they like being chased down stream behind the bamboo canes where they can hardly be noticed.

Male monkeys are inexplicably mischievous. I have seen some two episodes of a notorious monkey being subjected to mob justice apparently for setting foot in another monkey’s territory. That’s quite a trend in the park even though not all cases turn sour as the god forsaken notorious monkey may opt. I have also seen some old ones getting themselves in trouble behind the bamboo canes with little cutties younger by far.

For a while now, I have noticed that monkeys can really dance. Whenever my Indian neighbors turn music loud, you will see monkeys by the perimeter walls bouncing and moving in circles one to another. They don’t leave the spot until the music is turned down and they always leave in protest. I saw them the other day aggressively throwing empty punches in the air and hurling guava and loquat fruits all over. Some dragged their asses over the soil as others climbed up my poor neighbors’ chimney chattering disturbingly until they were dispelled by the smoke.

Some monkeys are smart yet others are lunatics. You can differentiate those that are full of life from those that are lukewarm. Belief me that watching these monkeys on any bright day is like observing what goes down in the conventional society of the more civilized beings. With keen interest, you don’t need science to tell that monkeys are Homo sapiens wannabes.

REMINISCENCE THERAPY- 2011

I remember those young days when I conveniently indulged myself in the right thing, a lot of prayer. It was timely right for me to do it because I had a lot to pray for. I prayed for myself, my family and my friends. I prayed to God to save me from evil and to help me pass my exams all the time. I even asked Him to make me rich and keep my dream of becoming president some day alive. Gospel music, morning devotions, a lot of fasting and bible studying was my way of life. And so God helped me to pass my exams.

The excitement and jubilation of the moment caught me in a different setting, outside school. Prayer reduced significantly, the food was too good for me to think of any fasting and like never before, the mornings were too cold to contemplate morning devotion. After all there was nobody to psyche me up.

All over sudden, life became different but too good for living. I had all the freedom to myself, my wallet had been made heavier and my budget bigger. For the first time in my life, a little pop of liquor bottles every now and then became a trend.

Buggy jeans, designer T-shirts and flashy jackets on top of colorful sneakers and Safari boots was the hip hop style then. With bling all over my teeth, fingers and ears and bandannas over my plaited hair, folks knew me as a little gangster with a crazy swagger in town.

I made a spectacle at my neighborhood; nobody had tried my style before. My room of loud music was full of picture decorations of Cool J, DMX, and J Blige among other big names then.

My pals always took any slight opportunity to come around for liquor but mom often turned them away. I however always sneaked in my favorite with whom I unveiled plans for dance floor nights at F2 on any given Wednesday and Friday.

Some guys accused me of watching too much TV and being a bad influence to their young ones but I dismissed them as whining old folks who had peculiar taste for life.

It was decided that I had to be stopped; so I was taken for a college preparatory course in a rather remote suburb. I knew my freedom was being curtailed in a way but I convinced myself that nothing much would change. 

Life in this school was strange and harder than I had psychologically prepared for. Guys were hard looking and arrogantly village like whom for a while made life a living hell for me but I had to learn to live like them. A few tracks of reggae music which they played repetitively through their small radio cassette every Saturday was all entertainment we could have.

I couldn’t take it any more; after all it was seven strange months in the wilderness. I had to leave but believe me I had become a hardened fellow. At home this time, I tried to take it easy by avoiding going back to my old lifestyle. For this reason I resorted to listening to a lot of roots reggae music.

I acquired new friends some whom regarded themselves as rude boys. The whole setting of my room became new with the Wailers and the Burning spears all over the walls. Tight piped jeans and plain T-shirts on top of Sahara boots became my new style.

My rude boys and I made it our business to attend all reggae joints. Some day I almost crippled my legs scrambling for entrance at an Impala club in Nairobi where Joseph Hill and his Culture group were performing.

I seemed to enjoy myself and for some time, this remained my lifestyle even though my rude boys often scared me with their weed smoking habits.

My first day in college caught me by surprise. There was nobody of my type to associate with, so life suddenly turned complicated again. I became unusually quiet trying to figure out what was best for me. After a couple of years when I was clearing college, it became clear to me that I had become of age.

At my next level of studies, I was comfortably calm as I was in college. I dressed casually, took no liquor and become lesser of a music maniac. I did no partying even though I fancied a little bit of flirting every now and then. That was not until a woman came into my life. Of course I had to respect her and even though we later parted ways, she put in me a great deal of sense.

Five years later, I have learned to make more sense out of life. None of the lifestyles I have evolved through appeals to me any more, in fact it’s embarrassing when I flash back to what I have been.But that will always be the case, people are hardly ever proud of their self past  lifestyles unless it’s that which I began with.

DON’T DESPISE INTERNS, GIVE THEM A CHANCE;

Internships are basically short term learning opportunities provided by employers to young scholars seeking to learn professional skills that will best utilize their careers. Interns being young and ambitious, they just don’t learn but also add much value to their working environment. Sometimes motivated with just empty job promises, they do as much as coming up with fresh innovative ideas which benefit their employers a great deal.

I seriously think that the essence of internship has increasingly been weakened hence turning it into fraud. Both higher learning institutions and employers these days make it so hard and frustrating for students seeking opportunities. Internship being a necessity for any serious student and compulsory in most institutions, students always avail themselves to the professional world in the hope of achieving some skills and exposure. However the prevailing circumstances are not making it any easier for these students. Quite often, it is not skills and exposure they acquire but a rude shock of their lives.

It is apparent though that frustration begins right at college when a student is due for internship. I know an internationally recognized public university which solicits for a compulsory internship fee from students yet it makes no effort to assist them strike opportunities. It merely provides bona fide letters which introduce to employers students who are due for internship. The university does not even bother to follow up beyond those letters despite complaints from many students demanding value for their money.

Employers too, particularly NGO’s have a tendency of demanding a non-refundable fee as a prior condition for offering internship. To most companies, internship is no longer a teaching practice but a cost cutting opportunity. Hence employers now recruit interns, overwork them with less or no pay at all practically denying them a chance to learn.

It is in the hands of employees that interns suffer the most. A part from a few who tolerate and accommodate interns as colleagues, most employees rarely see interns as valuable assets to their working environment. Some upon failing to inspire respect in them, they opt to unreasonably generate fear. Quite often, they feel so insecurely egocentric, an attitude which prompts bashing and discouraging of interns all the time.

My biggest concern is how interns obliviously get victimized sexually. This is perhaps the most prevalent injustice done to them. With rampant cases of sexual harassment at work, interns are always on the receiving end. Only a few brave interns manage to overcome these kinds of situations.

Every person who has ever been an intern has a memorable experience. Internship unarguably makes a life time career impact to many people. I hereby appeal to higher learning institutions, employers and those of you charged with the responsibility of mentoring interns to give them an easy time. You may have your personal prejudice against interns but it is important that they be taken care of.

By Duke Mwancha

HIDING UNDER A GLASS OF LOVE;

In this civilized globe we exist today, we seem to have succeeded in revolutionizing life as the end in itself. Culture, lifestyle, food, marriage, religion and technology are at an unprecedented class of their own. However, we often forget that unlike culture, lifestyle and technology, love is a short-lived recurrent state of emotion that is ought to help us embrace life as it is so as to be a better people.

The notion that love as we know it today is the beginning and the end to everything in living better is a misconception and the reason many relationships and marriages these days only survive until love emotions go off as naturally expected.

I don’t know many things but I know that love is an emotion just like any other. Without any intention to pontificate, I hereby refuse to be engulfed in the delusion of those who believe that the so called love is an eternal big brother who does not vacate a soul once he enters it.

I scotch a snake today even though there is nothing dangerous I know like a scotched cobra. I know how we so innocently pander to love, the supposed remedy to all misunderstanding in our relationships. I am ready and prepared for consequences coming with touching the holly affectionate devotion which by the way is apparently begetting more ashes than spawning more fires as expected.

The cliché “I love you” essentially means you care about a person affectionately but more so because it is rationally necessary to do so. However I doubt if this makes the much needed sense to majority of us. I am not unmindful that love is terribly the most misused word in the universe. Be it romantic love, family love, or even the love of God. It has always occurred to me that love is ostensibly the opium of the assumed lovers to postpone their troubles. It is an electric blanket of flattery that covers the world in fantasy that majority of us are willingly ready to swim through.

I choose to think of love beyond emotions-over and above what is close to the heart because it is obvious the heart cannot be trusted. How can it be trusted if it is inevitably a dwelling den for love and hatred where they outdo each other. What is more, the heart is vulnerable to other emotions that poison and weaken the affection turning it into cancerous selfishness. You of course know that selfishness can never be food for the heart- be it that of the devil herself. This is essentially because love is naturally divergent, rarely projected for self satisfaction but naturally designed to benefit and warm the hearts of other people.

How then does affection seal the world from its own inhabitants when they pretend to love by dedicating their devotion on actions that are out of any love in this world? Think of the countless incidences in society by which people despicably kill for love, human beings hunting others in the name of love irrespective of whom they hurt. How can I forget those who claim to love God by death and not to death? Delusive unreasonable mass killing believably to protect faith is also love, the holly love of God; dogmatic extremism and societal madness I would say. Cheating spouses cannot escape my attention, those with wild affection that poisons love. Men and women insignificantly human and vilely doggy.

Even for the young minded whom when things don’t work out with their loved ones the way they would wish -love does not exist! They thereby spit out poison spoiling devotion and superstitiously so, spelling confusion. No wonder these days, desperate feminine ones disown love. They opt to live for every cock like hen. Some will only hope to be blown up some day in spirit like Mary the mother of Christ.

I think it is easier now to realize that love needs more than just the heart to thrive. It needs the mind. Just like sympathy, sorrow, joy, happiness and assorts, love must be instigated to resurface when it goes under. There are several ways of enhancing affection when its floating but to rekindle love, two ingredients of the mind are needed; maturity and understanding. The two will keep love straightened when it’s hell-bent to bend for the worst. Maturity comes with respect and belief me; respect is worth its weight in gold. Understanding itself is a silver lined kiln; so then you can incubate your love. I guess you are now scotched, or are you?