Where are we? I ask, faintly remembering a large white castle and strange-looking white men.

Are they going to eat us? I hear a familiar voice on my right.

Owu, is that you? Please, are you okay?

I am scared, Kofi. Will they eat us and make powder from our bones?

Do not be afraid, the dark lady says gently. They will not eat you. But your noise will bring wahala!

What kind of trouble? I ask,

as she rubs my shoulder

and places my hand in hers.

GRAVE TROUBLE

The wonderfuls bring misery

and destruction to those

who do not look like them.

Their eyes covet the whole earth

and they see us as shadows

to step on.

They do not care

of our celestial origins,

that we descended

from the Great Good above.

They do not respect

our traditions

our heroic past

the power of women

the wisdom of elders

and spiders

the joy of peace.

They ignore the life-giving palm fruit

for its slippery, sweet profits

and cannot see even a glimmer of gold

for the riches it yields.

They do not care about

honoring the stars or

the magnificent sky

that houses them,

only that they can use it

to guide them toward

plunder.

The mighty river

that births us, to them

is a speedy path

to our destruction.

This place

is not a castle

of anything good.

It is a dungeon

empty of heart

and these alien people

with their wolfish logic

and wicked impulses

will eat at our flesh

until the blood of Asante dries,

and our steady beat is no more.

That is their way.

Since I came here

with child

eight months ago

I have counted

one hundred

and twelve

children

and women

taken from this damp, dark cell

never to return,

and each day

I kneel down

and say a prayer

to Bona, the Great One

that breathes mountains,

that my first child,

my beautiful little boy

who was unborn

days ago

right where you lay,

is near a star

in the sky

reunited

with all

that is good.

INTRODUCTION

She tells Owu and me

that her name

is Afua

that she is from

a fishing village

east of Kumasi

that her grandmother

is so tall she can touch the clouds

that her little sister

was ill

visiting the healer

when the midnight marauders

seized her village

and killed her intended

that she too speaks English

that there are

mostly young girls here

that she is but one of the few older

that we should call her Auntie

that there are fifty of us

some speaking

in a different tongue

that she has cooked

for the wonderfuls

in their spacious kitchens

with parquet floors

and views of a big blue sea

that sometimes the pink-faced men

with their dirty hair

and grimy grins

come in the night

and take a girl from this rotting hole

then bring her back

jumbled and sobbing

that she does not know