An Exotic Rajah (C) Poem by Margaret Alice Second

Misery is not an option, sitting in abject misery
accomplishes nothing - with two towels in the
freezer to wrap around my head in the extreme
heat, a wet bandana in my hair and a wet scarf
over my pants and a pail of water on my desk

I'm ready to face the supreme heat on the ninth
floor of this office building in sweltering Africa -
when I read the lovely tale of the 'Hope of South
Africa' - a young girl in a green dress begging
Old Father Time to bring people to fill her empty

land - as a child; I didn't envisage dying in my
country's heat after arriving here in fulfilment of
Father Time's prophecy of many peoples coming
to colonise this charmed continent; but today I'm
ready to dive into my Spanish translation -

checking terms as best I can, ignoring the fact that
my best has never been good enough, just content
to be alive, joyously anticipating my colleagues'
distress upon seeing the wet towel around my
head like an exotic rajah from afar…