Malaria Poems: That’s cerebral

“Roughly one in ten children will suffer from neurological impairment after cerebral malaria, be it epilepsy, learning disability, changes in behaviour, loss of coordination or impairments to speech. As well as being discomforting physically, these problems can also lead to stigmatisation in the community and can reduce individuals’ capacity for work, imposing an additional economic burden.⁴”

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That’s Cerebral

the doctor said        and it dispersed

slick through thick air 

quiet

barracuda

             shuttling sound       away

from mouth          mutating it to mean.

A compliment     in another place

            here sticks

            here clots

            here a death sentence    this time

           to a tribe full of other times.

There               a strong man

  whose great ideas

cannot be said 

                   a lone umbrella acacia alone.      Here

a girl of ten    confused    why her arms won’t raise

when she’s asked to raise them

      and her baby brothers.

                                      A tribe muscled

with dwindling

where cured malaria leaves

trails like listening.

4. Neurological damage from malaria. Ian Jones. 06/12/2002. http://malaria.wellcome.ac.uk/doc_WTD023883.html