After

It didn’t fall so much as it unfolded.
One minute, the sky was a familiar ceiling,
and the next, a bruise began to spread from the center out,
smothering the sun until the light felt thin,
brittle enough to snap between my fingers.

You don’t realize how much the light holds you up
until it’s gone.

Now, the air is thick with the soot of burned-out stars.
The iron draft of a closing door has changed everything,
it’s a predatory thing.
It’s in my bones now, pulling my shoulders toward the dirt,
turning my footsteps into heavy prayers that no one hears.
My knees have forgotten the habit of standing.

There is a cold, dense knot where my chest used to be,
a collapsed star, a private black hole
feeding on the scraps of my better days.
It doesn’t just take, it erases.
It has swallowed the before, the maybe, and the us,
leaving only this heavy, crippled silence
where my heart used to beat.

@doddyokelo

Let it Rain, Brother

Hey, broken man,
you don’t have to hold the sky tonight.
Let it fall. Let it rain through your chest.
Strength is not silence, it’s the courage to shatter
and still call yourself whole.
The world taught you to be iron,
but even iron rusts when it holds too much sorrow.
So cry, let your saltwater baptize the pain,
let softness be your rebellion.

You are not weak for weeping,
you are simply human enough to heal.
Tears don’t strip your masculinity, they cleanse it.
Let them fall, and when they do,
may they wash away every lie that said you shouldn’t feel.
Even lions cry, brother,
we just never stay long enough
to hear them mourn.

@doddyokelo

Love, Receipted

You call me lazy,
as if rest were rebellion,
as if the absence of a paycheck meant
I’d married idleness and sworn fidelity to failure.
You think I wake each morning to romance poverty,
to sip on the bitter tea of rejection
and call it breakfast.

You think I don’t hunt for work,
darling, I’ve applied so hard the internet knows my name.
I’ve learned new skills until my mind wheezes from exhaustion,
repackaged my dreams in “professional tone,”
and written cover letters that could melt granite.
Still, the silence from employers breathes louder
than any sermon on hard work.

But go on, roll your eyes like coins in a rich man’s pocket.
You love the performance of pity, don’t you?
The way you sigh,
You wear my struggle like a badge
that says “look what I tolerate.”
You hold my empty wallet against my neck
like a priest offering salvation through mockery.

Your friends, the walking bank accounts,
toast to success with imported laughter.
They look at me the way one studies
a museum exhibit labeled Before Success.
And you,
you shrink beside them,
embarrassed to be seen loving someone
who doesn’t come with receipts.

I know I can’t afford dinner dates,
but baby, I can give you poetry,
written with hunger’s ink,
where every word costs a piece of my pride.
You want steak, I offer metaphors,
you want champagne, I bring conversation.
But apparently, love without a tip is just noise.

You say I make excuses,
as if failure were a choice I make before breakfast.
Man, I’ve tried,
tried until my hope broke its spine
from bending too long under your expectations.
But effort doesn’t trend, does it?
It’s not sexy on Instagram.

You used to look at me like promise,
now you look at me like pity dressed for dinner.
Your eyes audit my worth
like a cashier scanning expired dreams.
You don’t even say it out loud,
but your silence spells liability.
Love, it seems, needs a payslip now.

So go ahead, call me disgusting,
a broke ass night certified by circumstance.
Laugh with your friends,
they’ve earned their arrogance.
I’ll be here, broke but breathing,
scribbling poems on the back of rejection letters,
because even in poverty, darling,
I write better than they ever will live.

@doddyokelo

We Met Again

I saw her again,
the girl I once loved.
Time had touched her kindly.
She wore a white dress, soft as a prayer,
and it clung to her form
like the wind belongs to the sea.

She was lovelier than I remembered,
not just in face,
but in the quiet grace she carried.
Clean. Still.
Like a page I might’ve turned too soon.

The dress, white as chapel vows,
did justice to every curve,
each one a line in the poem I once left unfinished.
She smiled,
not bitter, not bold, just enough
to stir something old in me.

She said I looked different too,
more like the man she always pictured beside her.
Stronger, quieter, maybe even kinder.

And for a moment,
in the gentle silence between us,
I think we both wondered,
not with regret,
but with a wistful sort of hope,
if the pages we wrote apart
could still make sense together.

@okelododdychitchats

Crunchy Honest Chips

I was born just outside my father’s home. I mean outside the fence. Not in a hospital. Not in some sterile maternity ward with nurses who smell like Dettol and sigh through masks. No. I came into this world the traditional way, on ancestral soil, barefoot and bold, like a true son of Asembo. My grandmother delivered me. I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it until my tongue is weary, it’s something to be proud of. It’s raw. It’s traditional. And I guess, so am I.

Asembo is about 15 minutes away from Raila’s Opoda Farm. But this is not about him. This is about home. Or the idea of it. Because although I was born there, I didn’t grow up there. In fact, it took me seventeen years to return. And when I finally did, with the awkward gait of a visitor in his own past, I found our home was no longer a home. It had become a farm.

The only proof we were ever there are the graves—traces of my father, my uncle, my grandmother, and my grandfather. The cement doesn’t crack. It holds secrets. They told me the land is mine now. Or at least part of it. My father was the last born, and in our traditions, that means the home was his. By extension, now mine. But what do you do with a piece of land full of ghosts?

There’s another parcel—12 acres or so. I didn’t earn it. Didn’t break my back for it. Didn’t argue with chiefs or attend land tribunal hearings in stuffy rooms with men who say “utu ni utu” before betraying you for a bribe. It was passed to me like a baton in a relay. A gift from the dead. So no, I’m not bragging. And even if I was, who really wants to sweat for something they can get for free? This is Kenya, after all. We queue for handouts and call it luck.

I grew up in bits and pieces—Homa Bay, Kisumu, Rongo. Like a nomad in search of permanence. In 2007, my mother built a modest house in Rongo. That’s home now. We live there with strangers who’ve since become family, the kind you don’t choose but grow into like an oversized sweater that slowly starts to fit. In Rongo and almost everywhere else in Luo Nyanza, people intermarry—Luos, Luhyas, Kisiis. But not Kikuyus. No, Kikuyus are where the line is drawn.

Luos hate Kikuyus and Kikuyus hate Luos. That’s the story we were handed by the colonialists—wrapped in propaganda and sprinkled with enough suspicion to last generations. Divide and rule. And rule they did. Now we inherit the hate like old family furniture we’re too proud to throw out. We say things like: “A Luo is a witch with a sack of rituals on his back” or “A Kikuyu is greedy and selfish” or that “Kikuyu women kill their husbands.” What is that? That’s not wisdom. That’s premium-grade poetic cow dung.

Ask anyone for proof, and they’ll stutter like a bad radio signal.

I don’t believe in what I haven’t seen. I won’t condemn a whole tribe because Otieno once borrowed your charger and never returned it. Or because Wanjiku blocked you on WhatsApp after you bought her chips kuku.

If that makes me fallacious, then call me a walking fallacy.

And listen, Kikuyu women are beautiful. Not the stereotypical light-skinned, big-chested, flat-behind and thin legs that don’t match the body types, those that your uncles warned you about. No. These days, they come in thick—size sevens with curves that look like they were negotiated in parliament. Faces sculpted like the gods used cheekbones as currency. And thighs, God help us, thighs the colour of roasted cashews—thighs that can save entire nations.

I’m dating one. A Kikuyu. Six years now, give or take a few breaks that almost broke us. Her name is Koi, but if you know her like I do, you call her Spiky. And Spiky? Spiky is divine.

Spiky is what you’d get if elegance had a baby with audacity. She walks like confidence and still laughs like she was raised by love. Her skin is caramel dipped in honey, the kind that makes you wonder if sunlight took lessons from her. Her smile is a gospel that can turn a hard man soft. She’s smart, too. Smart with the kind of intelligence that knows when to speak, when to keep quiet, and when to look at you in a way that makes you question all your life choices.

Her body is poetry. The kind of body that makes you want to write odes in traffic. Her mind is a map. Her heart is a home I keep returning to. Even when I say I’m done.

I am not here to convert you. I am just here to say—love is not tribal. Neither is beauty. Neither is home.

Some of us were just born outside, by grandmothers with hands strong enough to deliver a future.

And maybe that’s enough.

It was 2AM or thereabouts. You know that hour that’s neither here nor there—when the silence feels staged, like the night is watching you back. I wasn’t asleep, of course. My insomnia is back. It always returns like an old lover who doesn’t knock, just walks in and makes itself comfortable.

Spiky was up too, prepping for one of her strange shifts. She works those ungodly hours, where your body wants to rest, but capitalism wants a report submitted by 5:45AM. I decided to keep her company, texting back and forth. In the middle of our banter—whose contents I won’t get into, partly because I’m lazy and partly because it might send you off on a tangent—we veered into a detour.

“There’s a Mugithi na Ndumo at Red Room from 2PM,” she texted. “Come with me?”

Mugithi is a Kikuyu genre—think of it as country music that drank a full bottle of Muratina and decided to wear a hat. Ndumo is the dance—the erratic, shoulder-driven, hip-twisting rhythmic warfare. It’s like watching a fight that no one wants to break up. I don’t speak Kikuyu. I know only “mbesha shigana?” which loosely translates to “how much money are we wasting here?” But I said yes. Because love is also showing up where you don’t belong and hoping the rhythm saves you.

Google Maps says Red Room is in Kilimani. Technically true. It’s on Adlife Plaza. But if you follow those blue dots on Google blindly, you’ll find yourself in West Pokot or emotionally lost. Take my advice: get to Yaya Centre, take that left turn. Adlife Plaza is a few blocks in, across from Shujah Mall. Red Room lives on the first floor.

The place is cool. Genuinely cool. It’s shaped like an L, as if someone folded the club and forgot to unfold it. The counter sits at the center like a bartender god. There’s a stage—clean, slightly elevated, and a DJ booth carved with intention, not just dumped there. The seats in the regular area are metallic, but not the koroga kind. These ones have cushions that hold your secrets. They are comfortable. The VIP area, of course, has better seats—those white kinyozi-waiting-area chairs, only here they’ve been baptized and saved.

The roof is translucent, high enough not to threaten your dignity, and there’s space to dance without knocking a stranger’s elbow. The floor is plastic turf. That fake grass that doesn’t pretend to be real anymore. The kind you’d find in a cool rooftop bar, or a child’s playground where no one gets hurt when they fall—except emotionally.

Our waiter is polite. Genuine. The kind that makes you want to tip even when you’re broke. We order goat meat and chips not fries. I refuse to gentrify potatoes. Spiky, glowing like the first sip of good wine, is in wide-legged purple pants stitched by a fundi who understands women. Her top—a crocheted piece of African fabric art—is from the same fundi. She looks like Nairobi confidence dressed in culture. I’m in wide-legged pants too (no judgment), a free shirt I got from Dura Poa and my trusted white Converse. I order a litre of Muratina because, well, when in Rome… get tipsy on their traditions.

Spiky orders two bottles of Kenya Originals.

The food comes and we eat because what else do you do when food comes? Their meat is soft. Tender like it was raised by a grandmother with a kind voice. The chips are golden and crunchy—honest chips, not those oily, sad ones that taste like heartbreak.

Then comes Gasheni. She wasn’t on the lineup, just a curtain raiser. But sometimes curtain raisers leave you wondering why the main act even bothered. She did well. She cleared the path like John the Baptist. And when DJ Dibull came on, he walked through like the Messiah of sound. He played magic. I danced. I didn’t understand a single lyric but my body understood the beat, and sometimes, that’s all that matters.

Tony Young came in next. One hour and thirty minutes of pure Kikuyu Vaibu. By the time Waithaka Wa Jane got on stage, I think the crowd was tired. Or maybe he was just too mellow for 11PM energy.

Ah, I almost forgot—DJ 44. That man spins like he’s in love with every beat. Like each song owes him rent.

At our table, a couple and a lady joined us. Later, a guy. All of them were vibes. They figured out pretty quickly that I wasn’t Kikuyu—maybe it was the way I danced, like someone dodging potholes. But they embraced me. One of them told me, “If you can’t beat us, join us.”

So I did.

And I’ve invited them to the Luo Festival on the 9th of August. There, I’ll beat them. And they’ll join me. And we’ll call it unity.

Mugithi was greatness. Pure, fermented, cultural greatness. The kind that reminds you that sometimes all it takes is a beat for you to remember how good it feels to just live.

Thank you for this Spiky. I loved it Baby!

@okelododdychitchats

AND YET, WE VOTE

WHO PROTECTS THE PEOPLE FROM THE POLICE ?

You may write us off,
dismiss us ,
ignore us in Parliament halls padded with stolen wealth,
but still, we see

We are the country beneath your motorcades,
the hands that build and break,
the voices cracking in the dust
because hope costs too much now.

And yet,
we vote.

We vote for thieves in clean suits

We vote for wolves draped in our flags,

Enough.

We are tired.
Tired of job descriptions reading “Must be connected.”
Tired of degrees gathering dust
while our dreams starve in silence.

We are tired of joblessness turned into weaponry,
young men hired cheap to kill our own voices,
paid to break bones they’ve never healed in their own lives.

Tired of watching peaceful protesters
shot dead,
while those who loot in daylight
are guarded like royalty.

Tired of asking:
“Who protects the people from the police?”

Tired of staged outrage,
press conferences filled with air,
and politicians who only remember their roots
when it’s time to lie again.

You fight for positions, not for people.
You dine with the devil,
then kneel in churches too small for your sins.

You debate your egos on live TV
as our people dig trenches
not for roads,
but for graves.

You die to be seen.
But we die because we’re ignored.

Kenya is choking.
On debt.
On lies.
On the stink of promises unkept.

We are not asking.
We are telling.

This time, we vote with memory.
With pain.
With names.
With tears that learned how to speak.

This time,
you will not scare us with teargas.
You will not buy us with t-shirts.
You will not distract us with empty tribal drums.

We will remember who was silent when we bled.
We will remember who smiled while we starved.
We will remember who disappeared our brothers
and called us TREASONOUS CRIMINALS.

We are not the children you once fooled.
We have grown teeth.
We have grown rage.
And we are coming.

So let the ballot tremble.
Let your seats shake.
Let the ground beneath your stolen homes shift.

Because next time,
we are not just voting.

We are reclaiming.

And if you still don’t listen,
then hear this:

We are not afraid.
We are not asleep.
We are not yours.
Not anymore.

@Okelododdychitchats

#RUTOMUSTGO #ENDPOLICEBRUTALITY #RAGEANDCOURAGE
#JUSTICEFORELIJOSHUA

Everything Here Smells of You

Everything here smells of you.
And it’s driving me insane in the sweetest, slowest way.

The caution seat still wears your scent ,
like it misses you too,
like it knows something passed through it that doesn’t come around often.

The fleece blanket is basically you in thread and warmth.
I cover myself with it and swear I can hear your laugh if I’m quiet enough.

Even my chest,
my own damn skin,
smells like you stayed.
Like you pressed yourself into me and said, “Don’t forget.”

And I won’t.
Not with lips like yours, warm, like you know the secret to sunrise.
I imagine a kiss and it doesn’t even feel imaginary,
it feels like a memory I’m about to make again.

I love the way your waist fits in my hands,
like my fingers were carved with your shape in mind.
There’s something wild about that kind of symmetry.

You’re beautiful.
You’re art that didn’t ask to be admired,
but was anyway,
because how could the world not notice you?

@okelododdychitchats

The Sound of Love (In Three Words)

There is a river in my chest,
its current stirred by longing.
I have wrestled with syllables,
wrestled them like Jacob with the angel,
and still, they slipped from me.

I’ve summoned sonnets like old friends,
dressed up my ache in velvet metaphors,
cradled my truth in gilded rhyme,
but still, the soul was unclothed.

Words, those proud and peacock things,
marched across parchment
but none bore the weight
of my trembling heart.

Then came silence.
And out of silence,
three humble drumbeats:

I. Love. You.

They stood,
not as grand orators,
but as gospel.

Simple.
Sacred.
Enough.

@okelododdychitchats

It’s Colonial, I Swear

What happened before the roses came ?

1. Cold Showers and Pink Suits

There’s a special place in hell for cold showers and it’s probably somewhere next to the queue at the passport office. And now you want me to willfully take one, shave, powder my neck, and wear that pink suit that makes me look like a soft loan? Just to go out on a date? Bruh. That’s not love; that’s martyrdom. I did not survive Nairobi water bills to be out here moisturizing for cold balconies and cappuccino dust.

2. Love in the Time of Third Parties

Who even decided that love needs to come with an invoice and VAT? Dating in this economy feels like trying to start a business on a chama budget. You spend thousands to sit across someone in a place where both of you are silently trying to gauge who is more emotionally unavailable, while the waitress thinks you’re about to propose.

3. The Whitewashing of Romance

Let’s talk about it: is the modern date a colonial export? Imported like jazz music and instant noodles? Because, really, how did our grandfathers do it? They didn’t need a date. They needed a strong back, a hoe, and a keen eye for dowry negotiation. Now we’re out here buying roses that die in 48 hours, basically love-shaped perishables and calling it romance.

4. Introverts Anonymous

I’m not antisocial. I’m pro-solitude. There’s a difference. Why must love always be on display, like it’s a talent show and we’re all auditioning for the role of “Emotionally Available Partner ”? Me, I prefer my affection with a side of silence. Just Netflix algorithms that understand me better than most people.

5. The Psychology of Smashing vs Smiling

Some dates feel more like interrogations with ambience. You’re sitting there, trying to chew tasteless pasta gracefully while wondering if she thinks your smile means “I like you” or “I’m just horny.” You’re sweating from trying to remember if you mentioned you were raised Christian or spiritual but not religious.

6. Date Inflation & Emotional Capitalism

Who decided that love must be shown through receipts? That emotional availability must be measured by how many brunches you’ve paid for? I’ve dated women who thought the absence of fine dining was the absence of love. Hey, the pepper in my githeri is a form of affection. Don’t let capitalism gaslight your heart.

7. Domestic Love, Anyone?

Let’s stay home. I can cook, I can serve, and I can even throw in bad jokes for seasoning. No need for that performative laughter at Java. I want us barefoot in the house, arguing about how much salt I put in the food. That, my friends, is real bonding. And I can pause to pee during the movie without missing the plot or the bill.

8. Public Displays of Affection Fatigue

What’s so romantic about someone interrupting your moment to ask “would you like sparkling or still?” Let me love you in sweatpants. Let’s laugh over burnt ugali. Let’s fall asleep on opposite ends of the couch and meet halfway in a dream. That’s the kind of love that doesn’t make it to Instagram, but lasts.

9. Love Without Logistics

The planning of dates stresses me more than the dating itself. Reservations, rides, fitting into attires from 2021, it’s a full-time job. Why can’t we date like we used to play kalongo in childhood? Spontaneous, anarchic, and mostly in someone’s house with limited adult supervision.

10. Let’s Redefine Romance

So no, I’m not taking cold showers for a warm table. That doesn’t mean I love less. I just love differently. Quietly. Deeply. With less garnish and more substance. If love is a language, I speak it fluently in slippers and home-cooked meals. The balcony is cold, the city is expensive, and my pink suit is for weddings only. Choose your battles wisely. Choose your love even wiser.

@okelododdychitchats

Lady in Black

“Mimi ni wa kucum, oh, scrap that, my bad, I meant Mimi ni wa kucome.’”
I was raised in the village. Well, not really a village because Rongo qualifies as a town, but Nairobians will still call it Moshadha, or ushago, or something else altogether. Forget it.
I grew up in Rongo for most of my childhood and only moved to Nairobi for campus. That’s right, I went to Multimedia University of Kenya in Karen, Nairobi County. Before anyone comes at me with, “Multimedia iko Rongai, bro,” before we argue, check your maps! The lower fence of Multimedia separates Nairobi from Rongai in Kajiado County. So yes, I schooled in Karen and stayed in Karen for four years. Si ni Mimi nawashow.

I bring up this whole kukucome thingie because when I first got into the Nairobi scene, matatu touts kept shouting “Tao Amboseli,” I didn’t catch it right, so I genuinely thought every estate in Nairobi had an Amboseli, just like almost every hood has a Kwa Chief in it. Turns out, they were saying “Tao hamusini,” as in, fare to town was 50 bob from wherever the pickup point was. Today, I’m in one of the moderately pimped Mapepe mats of Utimo Sacco. It’s carrying Tao Hamusini from Umoja Jeska stage. It’s Almost full. People love it because the driver here, knows how to dodge traffic….I’m sitting in the back, on the left window seat, giving me a clear view of everyone getting in, and, of course, judging them. Before I’m done profiling my fellow passengers, a lady slides in beside me. She’s today’s topic. This is udaku for free, feel free to share it with your crew. I hear y’all love udaku, so buckle up.

She’s in a sleek black dress, paired with not-so-new maroon Nike TNs, probably Kamukunji stock, judging by the soles, which haven’t been worn down by exposure to air (yes, I noticed the shoes when she stepped in, don’t ask). Her makeup is flawless, compensating for her questionable style. Thick lenses with frames hugging her round face sit perfectly on her.
Her eyes? Twin pools of wonder and mystery, they speak in whispers, framed by lashes as soft as a lover’s caress.
Her lips? Succulent and juicy.
Her nose? Perfectly symmetrical.
Her face is a masterpiece on a perfectly sculpted body.
Her hips don’t lie. When she sits, our hips meet, and I feel something, a desire mixed with comfort and curiosity mingling with hunger. Unsettling and oddly familiar.

I don’t know her name, but I know she smells nice, her dreadlocks are freshly done, clean, and not a hint of dusty brown in sight.
The bus starts moving, and she turns to me.
“You look good,” she says.
So do you, I think.
“You smell nice,” she adds.
So do you, I think again.
Match made in heaven, I convince myself, until she starts talking. And talking. And talking. A relentless stream of words. This river has no banks. Suddenly, I’m not so sure. I reconsider my initial instincts about asking for her name or number.

She pulls out a Juicy Fruit from her Gussii bag (yes, that’s what it says, probably meant to say Gucci). The way she chews it… carefree, wild, tasting life with abandon. It’s unbothered. It’s maddening….

We are in Town now,

When we reach past Mfangano Street, she turns.
“What’s your name?”
I tell her.
She smiles and walks away, heading toward Luthuli Avenue.

I watch her walk. That dhudha (that’s ass in some local sheng language.) That graceful stride. That hypnotic sway.
And for a fleeting moment, I wonder if I could’ve traded all that talking and careless chewing for the simple joy of watching her disappear into the crowd…

I almost get knocked down by a bike. As I snap back to reality, I realize it’s partly my fault. This part of town is always packed with people and matatus. When you mix those two, it feels like the sum of mchanga wa bahari, a bit of an exaggeration, but downtown Nairobi CBD is always a madhouse. I apologize to the boda guy and keep walking toward Nyayo House, with the lady in black still on my mind… I’ll tell you this, if you meet someone in a matatu or anywhere else who catches your interest, don’t wait around. Go for it. Take the risk! The guilt of not trying is way worse than whatever the outcome might be. I wish I’d gotten her number, even if it ended up on that list of contacts I don’t talk to. At least I’d have it, and what I choose to do with it is on me.

All day, I can’t stop thinking about the lady in black. She’s in my thoughts, even in the words I’m about to say. I try to dodge the usual chaos of the crowded streets, so I take a detour towards Kencom, then City Hall. It’s quieter here, with less hustle, and the buildings are lined up neatly, giving off this calm vibe. It’s the kind of peace that lets me think about the lady in black without anything pulling my attention away.

As I get closer to Nyayo House, I notice the street next to Cardinal Otunga and Holy Basilica is lined with Kienyeji ladies, each with an eye on the crowd. They’re advertising cyber services, not with signs, but with their words “bro, cyber, printing…” They’re looking for people who might need a printout or scan before heading into Nyayo House. Their smiles say they’ve seen it all, and they walk with the kind of confidence only Nairobi’s hustle can teach.

I don’t need any cyber services today, so I head straight to the NEMA offices to meet the Nairobi County Coordinator. Her office is warm and welcoming, and one day, I’ll ask her for an interview. But today, I’m here for something else.

Catch you later, guys!

@okelododdychitchats