Bring me a white goat he said, your fortune is bad he said. 
Leaning on the shoulder of my uncle, my cells shiver 
Even as I hear they're hot from the thermometer, 
My pounding head lets the sound in from his chanting, 
And my burning nose hugs my sintering eyes. 

White lines zig zag and jiggle with his dancing skin, 
The hazy bones on the ground tell him everything. 
He knows everything, especially things I don't know. 
He speaks with my grand mother and grand father, 
And even people further into my genetic past. 

But my mind couldn't sit still: A white goat? 
To appease my Uwu, who taught me to pair my socks
To avoid tornadoes in the room when I find just one? 
Would Doh really hate his son's son to the point 
Of wishing him dead before any stub on his chin? 

The calligraphy of incensed smoke fills my thoughts, 
Staring at his mouth calling my aunts and uncles
Who seek a slab over my unbreathing head. 
Is this where dreams all come to die? Where the 
Maker warned we will be misled into cavorting with Evil? 

My uncle tells me this is ok, tradition suggests, no, DEMANDS, 
That in times of trouble, we should guess through bones
Which of those who love us in reality, through the smoke
Can be declared jealous, heinous, whether dead or here, 
So we can hate them, and thereby build up this lie as truth. 

(c) nyonglema