Belonging Everywhere

I sink my feet in my mother’s compound
Warm wet and oil black soil sips in between my toes
I say to myself, ‘she carried the soil of her mother’s land.’
The soil of fertility
The one that blooms flowers in August heat.
Oil black soil, that grows crops in the baking February.

I sink my hands in my father’s land
Warm dry soil slips through my fingers in the field.
I say to myself; ‘he carried the soil of his father’s land.’
The soil of defiance
The soil of freedom.

I have two nations on my head and three tribes on my tongue.
The hair at the nape of my neck curls up into a question
‘Where do you belong?’
My mother’s land where the language sounds like a morning prayer.
My father’s land,
Whose language sounds like warriors returning home from a war long fought in their hearts.
Yet here I am,
Speaking the language that sounds like a song.