Many years ago I saw a film that it affected me: Out of Africa, directed by filmmaker Sydney Pollack. I knew from the credits that it was based on the book of memoirs (of the same name) by Isak Dinesen or Karen Blixen, whom I had read in their extraordinary tales. I looked for the book then, and was able to reaffirm the moving beauty that the film had very appropriately versioned.

The challenge of The Ink Well allows me to return to that author, remember her and pay her my affection, through a small poetic exercise, which, in my creative inclination, recreates her intertextually.

In my exercise, the two topics are combined: Africa and brooding.

Thanks for the call.

Far from Africa

Kenya was still in his heart,
perhaps buried in their hills.
It was returning in the sunset
or the sound of the wind in the bushes.
And then it was your husband's eyes
died during a hunting expedition.
Death and loneliness,
the abandonment of beloved Africa.
Sadness installed in his soul,
and Denys' smile,
the taste of coffee in the morning
and that now nostalgic aroma.

Isak Dinesen (or Karen Blixen)
was returning to those Ngong hills
in his now-written memory.
"Maybe I should have died in Kenya," he thought,
"to be land on that hill,
remembered by the Maasai
and visited by the lions".

_{Karen Blixen, 1913 Source}

Grateful for your attention.

# #posh