Fire in the sky
October 20th 2013
Today Harare is covered in a choking pall of black toxic smoke
a thick fog seeping through every nook and cranny
the dry heat and hot winds of the last weeks has turned the city dump into a burning inferno
The scanty resources and inadequate management of our city ‘fathers’
unable to halt the fire and it’s the searing fumes
Today we sit sweltering inside (an unheard-of event on a Sunday)
watching thick smoke - through closed windows (also an unheard-of event)
settling in waves across the vlei – the neighbouring almost invisible
and we are over 7 km from the fire as the bird flies
Today we breathe our own burning waste
the inevitable consequence of the consumerism we comfortably choose
to ignore – once we have placed it in bins and had it taken away
October 21st 2013
the fire still rages this morning
some respite earlier when the wind changed,
but it is back …
burning, choking, eye watering toxic fumes
our little bit of self-made poisonous addition to the fires in New South Wales