I travelled back home

The air was thick with grief.

Death has stripped me of all language. At its strongest influence, it speaks loudest in silence. With everything else being built around it. The burial ceremony, the constant condolence visits, the vigil, the sudden outburst of grief laden moans of family coming to mourn with us, all build themselves around death. It rarely speaks, because what it does instead, far outweighs anything that it could possibly utter. Napata ikiwa ngumu to accurately describe the scenes that I have found here at home, after travelling to Kisii from Nairobi. Adi staki kuandika kuhusu certain aspects of this funeral. I am dressed in a warm navy blue pullover made of wool, and on top of it I have worn a brown leather jacket, with a very baggy black sweatpant. I’m in a room, which I cannot call mine, but it is a private space that has a bed, and piles of water bottle cartons that have my uncle’s face plastered over the sides. He is everywhere; on the bottles of water, in the eyes of the bereaved, their bodily movements, and on the walls in picture frames that captured a moment in his life. Getembe tv plays in the sitting room television, guests have occupied every single seat, as they console my grandparents. My mother has left the village for Kisii town and her absence makes me feel lonely, since I had travelled to be close by her side.

Argh! Grief robs us of life and it just isn’t fair! unapatana na wazee who cannot resist reminding you that the last time they saw you, you were an infant. unapata wengine hawakujui, so you have to remind them. My name’s Alvin, and I’m Betty’s only child. They grab your hand with a firmness that is followed by an explosion of unexpected affection. “ Oh so you are the begotten son, many angels are around you, God is good, he has been kind to you. Na ukona girlfriend? (I actually didn’t expect that)” such compliments flatter me, but as a single child in my mother’s only marriage that ended up in divorce. I don’t take them as seriously as I would, had the circumstances behind my birth, and existence, played out differently. Every waking moment of my life is a constant battle. And I fail to resist the thought that I am fighting it heroically by my lonesome, through whichever means necessary, and always striving to become what Nietzsche once called, the Übermensch, and overman, one who surmounts himself.

My mother has been avoiding me btw, she doesn’t look me in the eyes. Na venye jana nilifika Kisii 7pm kukinyesha vibaya sana. I had to walk a long distance until I met up with her na tena alikuwa amepark mbali from the bus terminal I had alighted from. She had a friend at the passenger’s seat, so I sat at the back, and then moved to the front after we had dropped off her friend. Kutoka apo, I couldn’t tell whether my mum was okay or not. It was still raining, and her eyes were fixated on the road. One thing, huwezi kosa kuona ama kupitana nazo Kisii ni manduthi, na ziko mingi sana. As a single child, I do not have the privilege of having siblings. However, my Dad went ahead and remarried, and we can debate whether his two other children from his second wife count as full siblings to me. I am the only child born out of my mother’s womb. So if I die, she will have no one else, and this drags at my soul. It hovers around my life and the actions within it, like a guillotine. My life has had its pitfalls, but they somehow haven’t destroyed me and my conscience. I am not bogged down by depressive thoughts, and neither am I defeated by the multiplicity of challenges that come with having such a family dynamic. In fact, by virtue of being a single child, I have the unscrupulous benefits of dreaming big without anyone being there to put in check my dreams and ambitions. As a young boy, I couldn’t help but dream and enact the imaginations in my head through the thoughts I had, and the words I write. How all these points of view played a role in making me who I am today. It is a privilege to be bequeathed by life with a certain propensity to dwell in the intellect and to bring all that has been dwelt upon through prose or the spoken word.

But being a single child turns one into an unwilling witness in the lives of others. One day, I will look back and think of the children left behind by my uncles who passed away young. One day, i will reflect on the changes that took place in their lives. The funeral is just one day, but it’s importance surpasses all others that shall come before. Either the mother will be strong enough to bear the burden of raising her family alone, or the problems will be too much to actually bear. My mother had four siblings, now she has two, and doesn’t it strike fear in your heart, when grief overrides all the splendid years enjoyed as family. I haven’t mentioned the tears of my grandparents, the shedding of sorrow from aged parents who when I got to greet them. Nilifika ivi kama nimepiga magoti nikihug grandma wangu who was sitted on a the sofa. I tried to console her, but my words felt shallow compared to her grief. Burying two sons is heartbreaking, adi mimi naogopa kutakuwa aje siku za usoni. I am filled with dread, that the heartache will be too much to bear. But in a twist of fate, ama sijui tutasema aje, I always as though, because of the difficulty of my individual life. I am better at handling crises. Tangu covid nimepoteza family members wengi, one after the other, as if they all had their tickets on a line. It makes me wonder, just how secure I am by myself, and how dependent I am of others. I carry, from this funeral, a stubborn refusal to be broken down by life’s tragedies. I have been stoic enough. In those formative years when innocence clothed my face, to now having the texture of memory carved roughly on my face, through the things I have faced in the consequence of events that have taken place in my life.

Since this is a funeral that is taking place from the maternal side of the family, I am an unknown quantity within the extended family. I rarely show up to those large family gathering events that Kisii people insist on. It makes sense that very few people in this side of the family have an intimate and personal relationship with me. I am known simply because I am my mother’s son, and not out of my own merit. Which translocates me out of the deeply personal moments that have been taking place throughout the grieving period. I am a cloud hovering about events, untouched yet weighed down by context, and circumstance. I actually feel like I belong more in the future, than in the present moment. I've shaken hands, being consoled, hugged and kissed on the cheek but nothing has prepared me for what await me tomorrow, sunday, when we move the body from the morgue to an overnight stay here at my grandparent homestead where my uncle had built a small house. Sijaona mauti yake, and i am scared, ningekuwa na whisk, ama ningekuwa mjakaa ningepiga nduru siku mzima. But I am a reserved Kisii man, and i know i will reserve my emotions and push them down to my solar plexus. Tena hiyo ni shida, juu my chakra is not even aligned. Shida apo ni ati ndabaki na remnants of unattended emotions without me even realizing, and when for example, I get intimate with my partner and become emotionally, zinaeza jitokeza hiyo saa na hakuna venye utazisimamisha.

Not to be an ass, but kuna time i was making love to my girlfriend and the strokes were so good adi nikaanza kulia, that was in missionary. hujawai jaa machozi kwa macho adi huoni partner unayempea strokes. I had to balance myself with one hand to wipe the tears off my eyes, while still stroking her. moments later pia yeye akaanza kulia, it is actually one of the best memories in my relationship na mimi mjinga nimewaambia in a blocked quote. adi waleo mimi hujiuliza how that was even possible when we the both of us were deeply woven into each other’s sweetness.

I might be overlooked as a person worth consoling in this particular funeral, but because i feel too deeply, and care too much for both my grandparents, and my mother together with her two remaining siblings. Inakuwa necessary kuangalia maisha baada ya the funeral date. Because both my paternal and maternal family has been touched repeatedly by the hand of death, and every touch feels colder than the first. I don’t want to cower from embracing these handshakes. I have been in solidarity with people around the world who’ve encountered death in the form of drones, and bombs flying from the sky. It would be hypocritical for me to say that in the two years since I started following the events of Gaza that I did so out of spectacle than emotion. It would also be callous of me to think that I am only supposed to feel grief for those whom I love. I love humanity, and death acutely exemplifies this trait. This is that Ahh Fuck it moment! Where there is no one behind, in front or beside you. All responsibility lies within your grasp. Oh! Captain, My captain! I have been writing about grief for the middle of October, and I am yet to meet it where it stands. My words seem shallow, and in their lack of depth they fail to exude the sense of gravity with which i face these tragedies. I was unwilling to look death in its eyes, afraid that it’s gaze would stick on me long after I took my eyes off it. But I am no longer young, at 27, there is great upheaval in life. Nothing is static, and nothing is certain. Everything seemed placed on auction. But I was born a fighter, and it is through the fight where everything is played out. I want to be seen as someone of strength and courage without being burdened by both. I shall rest in death, and nothing beyond it shall affect me, but I don’t want to die without exerting to the fullest capacity the willpower inherent in all human beings; that sends people to the moon, below the depths of the sea, and in scaling the mountain heights. It is a trait available in all of us, I shall strain my soul out of all its divinity. No one wants to be called a saint because they do not want to face the struggles that they endured in flesh. I am not a saint, but I am profoundly influenced by their sacrifice. Being human is not merely enough. I want to exude my humanity in a way that surreal events do not, as can be seen in the upcoming funeral—rob me of it.