Wrapped in a light orange veil
she sits on a stone bench
in a crowded courtroom in Katsina,
its ceiling fans moving hot air
like gossip passing over parched tongues.
Sentenced to stoning,
she has slept with dread,
every night the same image –
up to her waist in the sand-filled pit,...
We retired to the Deep South
with its switch grass and loblollies,
drawled talk in dogtrot houses,
winters without snow.
Nearing solstice, I survey fields
of spotty cotton balls
on battered stems,
not enough white to conjure
slopes of home.
As the Chattahoochee pulses
southward...
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