Uzodinma Iweala - Beasts of No Nation

Wherever we are going the moon is following us. It is so big and so bright that we are not using any torch to be seeing, so nobody is fearing that the enemy can be seeing us from wherever they may be hiding in this bush. They cannot see us if we are not having torch because we are invisible unless they are bringing helicopter to be beating the air BOTU BOTU and to be shining their bright light on the road. I see tree and its shadow. I see rock and its shadow and then I am saying let me just make it to that tree or to that rock. My eye is becoming used to the light and I am beginning to see more of everything that is around — each tree, each rock, each piece of rubbish or plant growing alone in the mud of the road. Wherever we are going it is only the moon shining and it is making the whole place to be looking like it is glass and will just break if you are touching it too hard. I am not liking this at all at all. If something is making of glass, then it is looking nice and beautiful, but it is also looking dead even if it is really having life. Everything here is looking dead when it is really alive. The grass on the side of the road, the tree behind the grasses, my arm or leg, Strika’s face, Rambo’s neck — they are all looking dead and making me to wonder how all of these dead thing can even be living. I am seeing each thing on the road — I am seeing them all stiff like glass, but I am not able to be seeing through them and I am knowing that the world is full of people and thing even if we are trying to look like they are not there.

I am hearing song. Someone is singing it. It is old song that my mother was singing all the time she is cooking or washing. A song! A song! I am not even hearing music for so long not even from bird. Hearing this music is making my whole skin to burn and I am wanting to scratch myself, my whole self, all over. I feel like I am wanting to dance, but is my body even remembering how? I don’t think so. I am sadding because of this. What is happening to the music and all the song we are having? I don’t know. I don’t know.

I am walking faster because I am trying to see who it is that is singing the song so I can be standing next to him and feeling this music. I am walking from this person to that person, but I am not seeing any sort of sound coming from their mouth. I am feeling like I should be going to that person who is singing and taking all of the sound so I can be having it for myself to be keeping in my pocket for whenever it is getting to be too too bad, but the sound I am looking for is coming from nowhere. I don’t mind at all, because the song is making my body to move and I am not having to think anymore. I am having to think of other thought that are just jumping into my head. I am not even minding the gun that is making my whole back to hurt even though it is very heavy. I am thinking of home. How many time am I thinking of my home when we are in the bush? How many time am I seeing all of the people that I am growing up with running around in my head like child running around after school, running to the house, running to the church, running to the market like there is no war and everything is just fine? In my head, all of the people that I am seeing in my home are too too happy and I am thinking, if this is how they are living, why am I staying here to just be walking to someplace not even knowing if I am to be living or dying? I don’t know. I don’t know.

We are tiring so so much, but we are trying to reach some place. Where is this place? I am not knowing, but I am knowing that Rambo is saying we should not be stopping. So we are not stopping and we are walking through the whole night into the day. The sun is rising behind us so all our shadow is growing front from our feets and making the road ahead very dark which is making it harder to be taking each next step. On this road, it is so empty and I am thinking where have all the people gone because I am not liking the quiet and I am not liking how the only sound in the daytime is the sound of my slipper hitting my own feets, the sound of my breathing so hard every time this is happening because it is paining too much. I cannot be stopping and so I keep walking. I am picking one noise, even if it is just one person moaning, and I am saying that I should be catching that noise so each time the noise is getting softer, I am walking faster to be catching it wherever it is going. They cannot be leaving me behind because I am not knowing where I would be going to in this bush. Just imagine if they are leaving me for the bush and then I am being eaten by animal or other soldier who is sacrificing me to be winning this war. I am thinking about the kind of animal that will be following me if they are leaving me. It is having the body of lion and the head of soldier with helmet and eye that are looking like bullet and teeths that are looking like knife to be chewing me up. Its tail is like gun and its breath like fire that is cooking me well well before it is sitting down to be eating all of the burning part of my body. When this is coming to my head, I am hurrying up my step so that I am not being the last one in the line.

My sweat is burning my eye away. Now it is so hot because the sun is beating on my back and making my gun to warm so much that it is feeling like hot iron on my back. I know it is making mark and burning my back so I am like cow and belonging to one owner which is gun. I am sadding when I am feeling this gun in my back because I am thinking that first when this war is starting, I am wanting gun because I can be using it to protect myself. At this time, gun is belonging to me and it is going wherever I am carrying it, but now it is just riding on my back like it is king and I am servant to be doing whatever it says. If it is saying go right, then my body is walking to the right even if I am struggling to go left, and if it is saying for me to stop, then I am stopping to catch breath, and if I am going down the hill with the other men, then it is saying go faster and it is pushing me down the hill just like that. I am not liking this at all at all and I am wanting to be throwing gun away into the bush, but if I am throwing gun away, then Rambo will be throwing me away because gun is more important than me. I am always remembering this.

The road is too long, but sometimes it is nice to be looking at. I am liking how it is just rising up and down like one animal, how it is moving with the land that it is sitting on. If you are seeing this road in sunshine, then you will be knowing how great it is and how all of the tree is even respecting it and not trying to grow in it. It is only small small thing on the road that are not respecting it, like small plant and sometimes small animal here and there that is getting run over by car and being left there for long time. I am fearing because there is nothing on road excepting us and these small plant that is not respecting road, and if they are not respecting road and road is killing them, then because we are not respecting road from going to toilet and spitting everywhere on it, I am fearing that it may be killing us soon also.

When we are walking, my mouth is tasting of salt, of so much salt that I am not liking the way that salt is tasting anymore. It is making me to thirsty so much and this is even worse than to be hungrying so much because it is making my head to turn from one place to another and the whole world is just spinning round and round me like I am walking in circle. One time I am seeing Strika in front of me walking slowly slowly then the next time I am seeing him behind me walking fastly fastly. This is making me to think am I mad.

We are moving always moving because that is what we are doing and watching all the thing on the road passing us by. House, tree, school, empty car all burned up, refuses, all passing us, but still we are not seeing person. We are coming into another village, but it is just small, not even really village. It is only just house on each side of the road, and it is empty, nothing there excepting the refuses. Person is running away from us like we are sickness, like we are the most evil thing to be on this earth. I am looking at road that is cracking in many place like somebody is just taking it and stretching it until you are seeing the red mud bleeding from underneath. And everywhere there is rubbishes just moving along the road like they are people just moving moving when they are having nothing to be doing. We are just moving until Strika is stepping on piece of breaking-up bottle glass and falling down. He is not saying word, not even crying or screaming. It is not even like he is feeling any pain, but I am feeling pain for him and it is making me to want to shout and yell. The other soldier are just walking by us and not even looking at us. Strika. Strika, I am saying. We are having to go or they will be leaving us. But he is not listening to me. Instead he is just taking his foot and picking away all of the skin until the glass is just coming out from his foot. Then he is just licking his finger clean of all the blood and the dust but making sure to not be touching any of the sore that is on his lip. He is stretching his hand out to me and we are getting up and walking. One step. Two step. He is falling down. Why is Strika doing like this? We have to be going now, but he is not getting up. Get up! He is just looking at me and coughing until he is spitting onto the ground next to him, blood and spit, so much blood. I am asking Strika to be getting up, but he is not listening and he is not getting up. His lip is moving, but there is no noise coming out. I am looking at him. His face is just shining shining like he is sweating so much, but there is no sweat coming out. I am kneeling down on the road next to him just watching all the other soldier walking away from us. I am feeling his heart that is just beating beating like whole village is stomping on the ground. Ah ah! Strika, I am saying. Ah ah! What is happening? But no word is coming from his mouth. His eye is blinking, my eye is blinking and I am seeing him crumpling up. I am getting up and pretending to be walking away. Don’t leave me, he is saying and looking at me. And I am shouting at him, come on! Get up and stop this thing you are doing! I am hearing, don’t leave me. Please Agu. Don’t just be leaving me. Strika is saying something. Enh! Strika is saying something! I am stopping to move, turning around and looking at him and he is looking at me, but it is like he is not even seeing me.