Afghanistan - waiting for the bus

By Adèle Ogiér Jones

Adèle Ogiér Jones has worked internationally for more than two decades, much of it in development, more recently in regions affected by conflict. From 2004 to 2006, when these poems were written, she lived in Afghanistan, leading the education program of the Aga Khan Foundation in northern and central provinces. Political themes are common in these

• Language: English
• Publisher: Debbie Lee
• Release date: Jun 20, 2015
• ISBN: 9781740279819

Book preview

Afghanistan – Waiting for the Bus

Waiting for the bus

---

The bus on the desert road never comes,

waiting on the mountain ridges is the same,

no bus passes this way, it never did

and may not come for decades more

though tanks, jeeps and the occasional four by four

carry the aid workers and military, never stopping.

---

People walk these roads for hours, days on end

glancing at strange vehicles flying by.

Donkeys few tread the way, occasionally a horse

but this is the way for footsore heels

hardened from trudging over sand, through snow,

no bus to carry fodder or to lead flocks to pasture.

---

The bus to Kandahar is long in coming

and to Helmand, Zabul, Uruzgan, Daikundi

no buses in, only poppy trains out

increasing year by year though soldiers roam

Swaying purple heads greeting tanks sent in

to cut them down, to root them out with insurgents.

---

Children tramp paths worn by wandering goats,

expecting that again the schoolroom’s magic

will bring a change to tired lives,

one behind the other they walk in file

caring little for heat, dust, waterless hours,

no bus, no complaints, they know no other way.

---

One, two hours, sometimes four to the schoolhouse,

same way back for children, teachers, new committee members,

new ideas to make things work

a bus to bring a change, ease the pain,

a solution for cries of danger, culture, work

to ease the burdens of daily life.

---

There is no bus, though explanations, excuses tumble

from offices and agencies travelling this way with tinted windows

air-conditioned, winter warmed vehicles on sturdy tyres

painted slogans telling all the good they do.

No country bus or village pick-up for these lonely roads

no bus for weary bodies lost in the mode of forgotten years.

---

The bus in far-off districts fails to come

a promise just as peace, from another time,

commanders, governments, aid and military forces

on different missions, in the name of regional stability,

designs elaborate, complicated, allegiances defined

but no bus, the simple things too complex on the road to peace.

The woman

---

The old woman

sits in the dust

outside the Jamiat-e-Islami office

one hand with a stick to help her walking and rising,

the other

held out to the traffic,

taxis,

land cruisers

of government officials,

aid agencies,

UN and

ISAF.

---

The old woman sits

day after day.

Eyes

without

hope.

The drone

---

Crunching the clouds

devouring the clear, blue sky

defecating on the horizon where only birds sang

minutes before.

Even eagles swooping

to capture tiny creatures below

are silenced in the roar and then the drone

of war birds

or

are they ‘peace’ birds?

---

Stability and suppression

not calm, peace and resolution.

Talk of reconciliation somewhere

not here.

Not in the land of the Aryans,

the land of Hazaras

and Uzbeks

and Tajiks

and Pashtuns.

Not yet.

---

Not in the land where the eagles are

US, British,

Canadian,

Italian, German, Spanish,

Australian, New Zealanders,

Hungarian,

Dutch,

Danish, Norwegian,

Polish

and on and on and on.

The media and the event

How many were killed?

BBC