The Hood Attachment, The Feel Alone, The Music, The Chaos, The Politician & The Hood Detachment (Painting GRIM)

I never moved out of my hood.

I always contemplated it but certain things keep me here.

Whenever there is a gunshot, I can tell you the bullet, hit the wall, hit some wood, it hit mabati, or even worse, it hit someone.

Thats how accustomed I've become to the sounds.

I bet you, in my hood, a five year old cant tell a cock crow, but can accurately estimate the distance from where the shot was fired.

My boss always asked me to move, he now prays that something nasty happens to me and I will afford a place on Riara Road. A 15k room in Nairobi West, now easily affordable, used to sound expensive.

I aint had a girlfriend because I dont want her to come to my hood.

She wont relax to Maxwell, Corrine Bailey Rae, Thelonious Monk, Teddy Pendergrass, The Delfonics, Yanni classicals, Gladys Knight, because gunshots rent the air and are louder than my boom twaf equipment (Thanx Archer, I had to borrow that)

"Why Didnt you get a local for a mama?", You ask me, Look at my taste, not in my hood, fool.

Bunny Wailer, Mutabaruka, Luciano rule the rewind button of CD players. Not my shimmy shimmy yah, not my Strange Fruit or even my 1-A-Hewa Classics, Not my 'Ni Wakati' tape.

A commotion ensued, as he was sworn in. "Ni Kii?", a mum with a kid on her back asked her mates on the roof top of the 'Gorofa Saba Flat'.

"She is one of them!" Exclaimed one of the youths. I watched her hit the ground together with her kid. Bones crushed followed by

Silence, deathly silence, loud silence hit those us who saw it. She didnt scream, neither did the kid.

The 'statemen & women', gleed as we sang them James & Bobby Purify's hit, we are their Puppets. Well, not romantically, but in the chaos they've hidden from, when the gas hits the blind eyes.

Where is your daughter? I didn't see your son throw a brick! I saw you run into Serena when hell broke loose!"

I hug Calm. "Where've you been?" She looks at me and says, "I wont be long, not until you all agree that you must cease to be their puppets.

I aint getting rocked, not tonite, may be next month, when calm brings me frog's croaks and the ear piercing cricket sounds, how do I know them? Thank you National Geographic, thank you New Hood.