Omar Musa - Here Come the Dogs

how I want to reward them with an ‘ umu

but I have nowhere to do a ground oven.

That I don’t know how to do it.

‘Pssh. That all? Thought you were coming to me with a moral question.

Too easy, cuz.’ Then playfully. ‘ Tsk tsk , a Samoan who doesn’t know

how to do an ‘ umu . Shame.’

I grin. ‘Tell me about it. Had to come to my best man. Thanks, uce .’

He hops into his car. ‘See you next Sunday, then?’

I crack my thumb knuckles.

‘To be honest, this ain’t my buzz, bro. I just. never got that feel, ay.

Never had that fire like you.’

He gives me a strange look

and I start to apologise

but instead he smiles.

‘Each to his own. Lucky you’re in Aus, though.

Wouldn’t get away with that in Samoa.’

‘Yeh, I know.’

His car throws up a ghost-shaped

plume of dust

that dances away into the summer.

Clint and Aleks are watching the movements of birds across a hellish sky. Men around them are playing cards and chess; others just pace the yard, anything to relieve the boredom. A man walks past with a Bible quote tatted along a shank wound.

‘Dunno, bro. It sounds good. We’ll see.’ Aleks is biting his bottom lip. ‘Might be time to go straight.’ He is distracted, having been composing a letter to his sister in his head. He is set to get out soon, and feels himself tilting every which way, like an egg running over a pan.

‘Fair nuff. Remember this number then, just in case.’

Aleks stares at Clint as he recites the number, and then silently repeats it several times. He won’t forget it.

The ‘umu

A pyramid of hot stones

tumble

into a thick layer.

Dense, stinging smoke

and Viliamu barking orders

at five church mates.

A pig,

eyes closed and mouth bloodied,

stuffed with leaves and hot stones,

sits almost patiently,

wrapped in wire mesh.

The men place thick discs of taro

directly onto the stones

around it,

then palusami wrapped in foil.

‘Sorry, uso ! If we were back home,

would’ve used the real thing,

not coconut cream from a can!’

I smile.

Dad used to say that.

Before the end,

he used to reminisce more and more,

about limu,

grape-like seaweed you could pick by the bunch in the reefs,

about pone,

the angel fish that could be eaten raw with seawater,

its flesh bitten off the bone,

stripped there and then when the fisherman came in.

Viliamu has marinated

some chicken and fish

and he smiles at Muhammad’s dad,

nodding to show that he is cooking it

separately from the pig.

Muhammad’s dad

doesn’t seem to care

and is sipping on a beer.

The kids lean in to watch.

I’ve cut my dreds short

with a nice fade up the side.

The square basslines and live instruments

of ‘The ‘Umu’ by Koolism

bouncing from the speakers.

Seems appropriate,

even if Hau is Tongan.

Scarlett sips a beer,

speaking rudimentary Samoan to some of the aunties,

who look well chuffed.

She learnt some at school,

she reckons.

Amazing.

Soon someone has a guitar out

and is shouting, ‘Turn that rap crap off.’

The sky is darkening,

being played into night

with each strum.

Several voices harmonise straightaway.

Mum sways and sings along,

smiling serenely,

wrinkles appearing at the corners of her mouth,

and it occurs to me

that she is entirely heroic –

her whole life an act of balancing, outlasting,

of living out her name.

A hand on my shoulder.

Viliamu.

‘This is a good thing you’re doing, uso .’

‘Ah, it’s just ball. A bit of fun.’

‘No. Tautua. Service. It’s important, it’s who we are. O le ala o le pule, o

le tautua. The way to leadership is in serving.’

‘Yeh. Dad used to say that.’

An auntie is dancing now,

twisting and unfurling her hands,

her big frame controlled and delicate.

‘He’d be proud of you right now. He was a good man. Used to send a

lot back to the village.’

I feel guilty. ‘Do you send any?’

Viliamu nods slowly. ‘Yeh. Yeh, I do. Wonder about it sometimes

though, cuz, ay.’

We are all music

and smoke and night and now.

The world

The world is opening up and stretching out,

being sketched in biro

and coloured in.

My skin, too.

The needle goes in –

I register it,

accept it.

Scarlett is tattooing a kite on the back of my arm.

Each puncture

is beauty and sadness,

is fear of falling back into bad habits,

is furious freedom,

is knowledge I can change,

that I have changed.

Beneath our feet,

tectonic plates are gliding,

shifting.

It is Aleks’ last day in prison.

He wants to wish Gabe good luck, although he knows the man needs much more than that. He thinks of giving him the cross or a hug, but instead he speaks. The words a cascade.

‘Violence.

‘Anyone can do it, brother. Just depends on the village you grew up in. And chance. Dunno. When I first got to Australia, I used my fists because no one could understand me, because they used to point at me and say, “Wog! wog! wog! wog!”

‘It became power, but I was powerless to control it. Figure that fucken riddle out. But that doesn’t explain everything. I’ve always had it. It starts as a feeling in your neck, in your spine, tingles all the way up and then it burns, uncontrollable, and it has to get out somehow.

‘All of a sudden you’re bashing some cunt and, if there was no reason to, you make one up; you can’t stop, you don’t want to. And when you’re finished, brother, your hands are bloody, your dick is hard. The closest I’ve ever got to poetry.

‘But that’s changed in me now, brother.

‘I won’t sell my soul for no one again. Not my wife, not my daughter. Before, my soul was out for rent. If it was for my family it didn’t matter how bloody my hands got. Hell exists here. I’ve burned on earth, many times. And I won’t do it again.’

He looks up at Gabe and his eyes are grief-filled. His voice lifts.

‘No more, brother. Cos there’s only three types on this earth — the winners, the losers and the dead.’

I’m walking up the street,

ball against my hip,

watching an African woman

carry her washing on her head.

Daniel Merriweather in my headphones.

What happened to that dude,

so soulful with all his angel-headed devils?

Scarlett just told me some news.

‘I’ve been offered a full art scholarship in Perth.’

‘What are you gonna do?’

‘I’m gonna take it. But what are you gonna do?’

Fuck, man.

Cherry-blooded summer,

maybe the perfect time for a new start.

A sheer wall –

the whole year

faces it.

Do you climb it and peek over?

Graff every inch of it?

Knock it the fuck down?

The court will give me an answer.

All I have to do

is breathe and run,

turn my limbs into a Kevin Durant-style

lava-hot slingshot,

and hurl shooting stars at the basket.

The smile drops off my face.

A bloke is hammering a sign

into the earth.

‘Development Notice.’

‘What the fuck’s this?’

He looks at me like an idiot. ‘We’ve been surveying it for months,