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By Davis Ndyomugabe of Qachecks

What happens when geography, politics and language collide in a poem? In Staying Afloat!, Davis Ndyomugabe of Qachecks takes readers on an unpredictable journey through places, sounds and world events. From Kandahar and Tora Bora to Paris, Spain, Tehran and Tiananmen Square, the poem bends names and phrases into puns, rhymes and satire. Beneath its playful language lies a restless commentary on conflict, power, history and the strange world humanity is trying to navigate.

If you are in a hurry,
Do not rush to Kandahar,
Or else you are smoked out
Of Tora Bora caves!

Not an urgent post mail,
Try it not in Lima or Mali.
To go there more times
Will not bring you closer to Rome,
Unless you want to pick up
A melon in Lomé.

Certainly, many get lost in loos,
Though noble ones
Receive a damsel in Oslo.

As cocks brawl and bang in sigh land,
As it were,
Hens often bang a cock.

Believe you me,
Please do!

You cannot go
In a tale of two cities
Unless you are in pairs.

Otherwise, frogs will kiss you in Paris
As you suffer grief in pains.

We shall limp across to Spain
Before your perilous snipe,
Unless you lean on your spine.

As no man is no man
Without a penis.

The military is parading nude
On Mahé sands,
While pharaohs smile
At their handiwork of pyramids.

Tourists must laugh,
Delighting in peace
At Dar es Salaam.

The belittling of Africa
As smaller than Greenland
Is over.

Since trumpets of defeat
Are loudly blaring as I-ran,
Ayatollah is raging in Tehran.

Ayatollah is raging in Tehran.
Ayatollah is raging in Tehran.

MAGA is confounded,
And Zelensky is bleating
To put in—

Put in!
Put in!
Put in!

Each side of a soccer team
Ping-pongs XI!

And in 1989,
At Tiananmen Square,
It was a massacre—

Just as they had
A prayer mass-on-an-acre!

And it’s just three years since
When he was a mere
Bartering rookie!

— Davis Ndyomugabe of Qachecks

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