Namibia and the orange ladies

The Indigenous Himba People

Are genuine and true

A simple life out in the wilds

its what these people do

A great respect for their animals

their villages remote

simplicity is paramount

Creatively they  note

sheep and goats

and Morani worms

Help make their dream come true

their hair, their skin, they

douse in okra stone and butter
a way

of conditioning themselves

with an  orange hue

and with herbs smoked

for that scent

Gives sheen and lustre

And the eye

finds its true content

Their integrity is everything

their totality we see

the women fetching water

fetching firewood and they be

simply cooking porridge

and Morani worms  and they

are extra happy with their lot

on any given day

Theres a wholeness

and an entirety

about their way of life

drowning in the colours

compounded by the strife

of moving camp

the need to be

nomadic through and through

an orderliness about them

and unbroken order too

Its their simplicity

that grabs us

pathfinders if you will

the magic of the countryside

the different hues that spill

and change with light and shade

the very soul of Africa,here

a foretaste for their  journeys

i leave behind a tear

a constancy of  what is

Nature that abounds

peculiar and irregular

coupled with the sounds

haunting melancholic

the individual they

shine with such emotion

at the back end of each day.