Cricket in Kabul

Poetry/Spoken Word by G Dubya Clothespainter, April 2005

Through shards of glass,
My eyes move to the dusty street
Kabul greets pupils with
The melancholy of a darkened sky
 
Awaking from a sleepwalk
by falling over a chair
Shouts interrupt naval gazing
And replace it with the
Urchins of Kabul, playing in their paradise
 
A motley crew in plastic sandals
And ill fitting clothes
Play cricket with a coke bottle
As the sky closes in
 
A boy in the yellow stripes
Hurls down a ‘bouncer'
And just like the dreams of his fore-fathers
The bottle is hit into the open sewer
 
But courageous as they are
The new Afghans
Have emerged from the sewers
Without regret or tears for the past
 
So the batsman retrieves the bottle
From Kabul's cess pool
Perhaps each delivery here
Holds a silver line?
 
With the new Afghans playing in the gutters
I see
iridescent light
breaking through the clouds
 
Could this be the new dawn?