mouth

it has become     a reconciliation 
this return to the jaws of the river
        waters         that held                   my adolescent anger
    draw me   back in   with their tidal wave 
    on the opposite bank   the old colonial fort    remains
     captor of my ancestors      is now my witness
I stretch my eyes out         to the horizon
  searching             for the point where
river   
         pours   
     into sea

away from the interior
I turn my back
to the concrete walls closing in
but I cannot escape
      the white teeth   gnawing our hills
          if we drain this body   of all its    fluids   will we find
        the carcass of our grief at the river bed 
or does the sea swallow us 
           whole