The Lady Missionary

I shall arrive in Africa
in gauze cloth
and smelling of honey.
I shall have sightings
of large hills and a far star
which I shall name.
I shall come and go as a man
and bag a tiger
on a mid-week afternoon.
I shall plant
a dahlia (or other foreign
flower) in tinderbox scrub
and wait for burst skies
to lather
petals from its thigh.
I shall awake
in blue days
unlaced by hornbills
and sleep
safe and naked
under solid slabs of sky.
I shall teach
that women should not be sold,
blood is not for drinking,
a chicken's entrails
can never
bring good rain,
and that beads
are cheap
as dirt.
All day I shall fill the world
with love
and infinite mercy.
See how my kind,
pink hands
mark time
in this place
I now fully comprehend,
but where I cannot pray.