Salt: A tribute to Ghana’s fishers
Chains on a vessel
He skips a beat
It’s just… you know… back in the day…
Now it’s fish they ship away
A pool of blood
A moonless night
Such tenderness
Your light shines bright
The open sewer
The tuna stench
Their graceful posture
My back on that bench!
Crabs, coral and canoes
None spared by the gigantic net
A threat, a kick, a bowl thrown at you
Rusty water still tastes wet
Mornings at the navy base
The fiery star’s hot kisses
Lucky me, I said – who said?
Theirs is work no one misses
Traffic, more traffic
The road never ends
Under the madman’s strict orders
The black man’s back bends
Fieldwork is sweating
The big stuff, the small
It’s learning to sit with
The ache of it all
Fieldwork is heart work
Sometimes it’s fun
And always in Ghana
The sun. The sun.
Salt: A Tribute to Ghana’s Fishers was originally published in Green Humanities: A Journal of Ecological Thought in Literature, Philosophy & the Arts.