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COMMENTARY
reason I write
(William W. Savage III)

The reason I write
by Brian Kasaine

I tried my hand on masonry, but I couldn’t build.

I asked her out, but she asked me out; of her life.

I tried my hand on clay, but what I made couldn’t stay, so I quit the game.

I cried to God, told Him I’d tried but was now tired and tied by frustration.

He said, “Son, get up and play, have you forgotten you’re clay in my hand; am the potter. The power you’re looking for is within, just calm and come back to your senses, you’ll find your way.”

So once again I tried. This time I put hands on knitting and after meeting my final creation, pain began eating my entrails; a dumb piece of art looking like a frayed piece of rag hung desperately on my palm.

I tried to build a road that people would walk on to success, but at the end it was worse than a mud track leading to a cattle kraal. People walked on it toward me to mock me.

I have an aversion for the kitchen but I tried cooking. Now you know the reason after tasting they were spitting, and the rumbles of their stomachs made me cringe.

At this point, I could have gone to hell in a handbasket but I chose to hand myself a basket full of courage.

So this time I tried carpentry, but the more I used sandpaper on my crooked creation, the more it felt like I was using it on my heart.

On my way home to nurse my pain, I stumbled and fell. As a quick reactor I let my palms spread to shield my head and torso.

When they touched the ground, the right one fell on a pen and since then…

You’re still asking the reason I write?

I was born to build. My pen my tool; I build a world of my own on paper, and this time it stays.

Keep me in the loop. Thank you, champ.

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Lesalon Kasaine is a Kenyan writer and journalist based in Nairobi. He has been a contributor on NonDoc since 2017, publishing poems and short stories. He has authored a crime thriller, Three Bolts From The Blue, and an anthology, Around The Campfire. He works as the content strategist at Qazini, a media platform that seeks to drive systemic change in society.