Goats
Author: Mabasa, Ignatius
Date: 2013-03-30T22:00:00+00:00
Keywords: African Literature; Culture and Conflict; Human Rights; Short Story; Zimbabwe
Publisher: ICAPA

about BREAKING THE SILENCE: Breaking the Cycle

BREAKING THE SILENCE: Breaking the Cycle is a storytelling project about violence in the Zimbabwean society.

Zimbabwe is in the grip of a chronic pandemic of violence, from the domestic sphere to the public sphere. Zimbabwean life has become cheap to other Zimbabweans and perpetrators appear to get away literally with murder while survivors are numbed and intimidated. Silence becomes the perpetrators’ greatest shield.

Breaking the Silence tears through the veil of silence by bringing the debate on endemic violence in Zimbabwe into the centre of the public domain.
Material for these short stories was collected through a call for stories on violence by The Institute of Creative Arts for Progress in Africa (ICAPA) Trust.

This is the second story published from the BREAKING THE SILENCE series.

For information contact
projects@icapatrust.org
or visit
www.icapatrust.org/bts/index.html

GOATS

A short story by Ignatius Mabasa

ISBN 978-0-7974-5899-4

My goats escaped and destroyed my neighbour’s maize crop. I did not send my goats to do that, and I did not want them to do such a thing especially when the rains have merely been a grasshopper’s spittle. Nzara yapfunya chisero muno mumusha and every grain of corn counts.

Darkness was falling and the village was preparing to rest after a long day of crying hungry children and foraging for food. Cattle, goats and chickens were just beginning to get cosy in their homes. My cat was licking himself and punctuating the game my grandchildren were playing with food-begging meows. He was a thin cat with warm green eyes. In this year of drought, even the mice seemed to have run away. As a result, the cats had nothing to supplement the meager meals they got from their masters.

I was cooking supper for my two grandchildren, but the fire was wet and giving a lot of smoke. My knuckles ached as I curled them round the wooden stirring spoon. These days all my muscles are in the habit of getting stiff and I don’t sleep well. My body protests at being laid down.

Smoke from the wet firewood stung my eyes and made it difficult to breath. I was fighting too many things — wet firewood, stinging eyes, little clean air and stubborn watery mucus that kept coursing down my upper lip. Yet in my heart I was proud of myself and content. Not many grandmothers in this village can give their grandchildren two meals a day as I do. Wet firewood and aching muscles were not going to make me fail to do my duty.

My grandchildren were singing the smoke song:

Smoke smoke go away

Ndakarerwa nambuya

Smoke smoke go away

Ndakarerwa nambuya

I was blowing the fire, when Mubaiwa burst into my smoky hut like a bolt of lightning. He burst into my hut at the very moment the fire also exploded to life. My grandchildren clapped for the fire with great joy, but quickly stopped to greet Mubaiwa who was standing snorting like a pig.

“Manheru sekuru vaAnna.” My grandchildren spoke clapping their hands in discord like popping corn.

Mubaiwa did not answer. I don’t think he even noticed the children. There was fire in his eyes. He snarled and discharged a gob of mucus and hatred which landed on my face with a dull splat sound. The sickening and smelly slime slowly crawled down my left eye to the bridge of my nose. I nearly vomited before wiping it off using my doek. I could not understand what was happening.

While I was still trying to rearrange myself and gain composure, Mubaiwa shouted, as if he was chasing marauding baboons from a field of maize. “Witch, today I am not leaving this place until you kill me. You sent your goats to destroy my maize crop so that my family dies of hunger. You must also destroy me. Isn’t everybody in this village says you are a man? You are self-sufficient and I see that you are even cooking supper when everybody else in the village is starving!”

The language. The anger. The abruptness of all this paralysed me momentarily. I felt a cold chill all over my body. I was confused. With a borrowed croaky voice, I ordered my grandchildren out of the hut. Poor little souls, they too were shocked and numb with fear. Their tiny faces were long like a candle stick that has been distorted by dripping wax. They stumbled going outside. I could hear them crying outside. The cat too was terrified and purred loudly bristling his fur before escaping outside.

When my grandchildren were safely outside, I opened my mouth, but no words came out. I instinctively knelt before him clapping my hands. I wanted to say I am sorry, but his big foot kicked my clapping hands and they flew like terrified doves. The pain in my fingers was worse than the other time I accidentally spilled hot water on them. I panicked. Something in my heart told me that this man wanted to kill me.

I apologized using his totem and told him that I was prepared to compensate his loss. He sneered and said, “You witch, is that why you let your goats destroy my crop? You wanted the world to know that you can easily pay your way out of situations. Yes compensate me, but today you will tell me why the dog can grin but is not able to laugh!” He raised his hand to attack me, and I screamed. That made him even more rabid. He surprised me with a vicious kick in the face. The kick split my lower lip. Pain painted a mural on the floor with my blood. I hit the ground and saw blinding darkness.

I could not believe this was all about goats. I slowly raised myself from the ground. I was expecting another vicious kick, so I naturally covered my head. When I spat out sour blood, I also spat out a tooth. I begged him to stop beating me. I begged him to take me to the chief or to the police. He laughed and said, “I want justice my way. Isn’t everybody says you are better than me. You are a self-sufficient woman. Show me what you are made of.” He pushed me to the ground and I fell exposing my thighs and underwear. I tried to cover my shame, but he kicked my hands. He let out a cold laugh and said, “So you are a woman after all huh? If you are a man, get up! You should know that real men are the ones that remain standing.”

His words cut my spirit into thin strips. Seeing my underwear somehow excited him, and I feared he was going to rape me. Instead, he beat me with his bare hands on the buttocks like he was spanking one of his grandchildren. He touched me where no man who is not my dead husband should touch me.

Then, he suddenly stopped and looked around my kitchen. He eyes fell on my cat which had probably come back to check on the supper. He swiftly snatched my cat like a rag and hurled it against the wall. I watched in horror as my cat spun towards the wall like a maize stalk caught in a whirlwind. Then, it hit against the wall and gave a loud painful cry before slumping like an empty sack. There was blood coming out of its mouth and nose. It died instantly. By now darkness had fallen and even my fire had died.

When the other villagers arrived, I just wanted him to kill me. They found him peeing on me. His warm and smelly urine hissing angrily, aiming for my covered head. And I know this was not anything to do with the goats. Something in me decomposed and I can still smell it.

When they tied him up and carried him away, he had become very violent and was cursing.

My daughter who is married in the next village came to help me. She and the other villagers wanted me to go and report to the police, but I could not do it. I was bed-ridden for three days. I think I it was my blood pressure more than the assault that made me unwell. I am very afraid of Mubaiwa and of my goats. I can’t sleep. I can’t eat. Worst of all, I feel very guilty. My goats destroyed Mubaiwa’s crop. He happily took the bag of maize that I offered as compensation, but said he is not finished with me yet.

I wonder what Mubaiwa is going to do next? People say I should go to the chief or the police and report him, but I can’t. I wronged Mubaiwa, but also he is a man and I am not. The chief is a man and I am not. The policemen are men and I am not. In what language do I tell them what he did to me? I want justice, but I am afraid. I am afraid of everything because I think what Mubaiwa did to me is not just about my goats. After all, didn’t he say, “real men are the ones who remain standing?” What about women? God help us all.

***

This short story is also available in print in the anthology FAMILY PORTRAIT published by ICAPA and currently available in Harare.

For more information contact

BREAKING THE SILENCE
animations by Mehluli Hikwa

Mehluli Hikwa

this project is supported by

Table of Contents

- Unnamed
- Unnamed
- Unnamed