Market After Rain. Poem by Sakko Marwa Musa

The rain withdraws,
and puddles are born-
purposeful pools
gathered like praying circles
in the hollows of the earth.
Children arrive first,
their laughter breaking the morning,
feet splashing through reddish-brown water
the elders step around
with practiced caution.

After the rain,
traders tremble
at the memory of another flood.
Tomatoes lie stacked in wounded red,
their skins split like unwanted flesh,
leaning into conversations
with spinach stalks
and pungent onions
still breathing the heat
that lived before the storm.

After the rain,
morning sings its damp hymn.
Behind the drying stalls
linger the things men would rather forget-
waste in many shapes,
standing in different sizes.
Then the sun begins to smile,
slow and knowing,
yet the smells they carry
betray every effort at composure,
rising like accusations
from the soaked ground.

After the rain,
men in lifted robes call out,
their voices cutting through steam and stench.
With hired tools in hand,
they enter the labour of cleansing.
Plastic sings
in soups of clay and mud.
Maggots colonize carcasses,
white waves moving
through putrid passages,
while men work
hand in hand
against the stubborn memory of rot.

After the rain,
the market heaves a sigh of relief.
It remembers
its long-lost glory-
when prices wore
the cloth of certainty,
when abundance sat openly in baskets,
untroubled by speculation,
and bounty did not tremble
at the hands of tomorrow.
© Sakko Musa Panya.
06/04/2026.
Sakko Marwa Musa.