Mom

What is a Moslem

I mean for real

Who is a Moslem

I mean for real

What must I do

So I can call myself

Moslem

For real

Like you, mom

Mom

Please tell me

What makes a Moslem

Moslem

Mom

Why do all Somalis

And I mean all Somalis

Bar none

I mean all of them Somalis:

Il Buono

Il Brutto

Il Cattivo

I mean all

Including

Tutti-frutti

Tutti Farabutti

Tutti Figlio di cani

Tutti Figlio di nessuno

Tutti Figlio di Indigini di Buscaglia

I mean

All

All the Twerps

I mean

All the Tyrants

All the Terrorists

All the Torturers

I mean

All the Traditionalist obscurant obstructionist oafs

I mean

All the Procrustean pious bigoted pigs 

I mean

All the Obnoxious Oddballs 

I mean

All the Treasonous Treacherous Traitors

I mean

All the Terrible ones

I mean

All the toadies

All the timeservers

All the temporizers

I mean

All the refractory riffraff ruffian reactionaries

Who sup on the roots of bitterness born of stubbornness

I mean

All the Sorry-arsed SOB slobs

Who are squealing now

Come weal

Come woe

Our status is the quo!

I mean

All the Aideed Gardeed Habar Gidir

Who never ever want to listen

To the consensus of the Ummah

To the considered learned words of the wisdom of the Ummah

Who never ever want to learn

Who always want to earn

The wrath of Alalh

I mean

All the lousy Liars

Whose loin-clothes are on fire right now

I mean

All the Talibans

All the Cannibals

All the Calibans

I mean

All the Kalaabeen

I mean

All the Kleptomaniacs

I mean

All the Kleptocrats

Like Galayrd

I mean

All the Midgets

All the Monsters

All the Morons

I mean

All the mendacious myrmidon minions of Mahamad Siyad Barre

Like Ina Sad Salad Prozac Boy

I mean

All the Hutu Hawiye Hirab Habar Gidir hellhounds

Who have been holding sublime Somalia

Who have been holding our collective future

Who have been holding out collective fate

In fee

In fear

In folly

In smear

In hock to the Habar Dugag

For the last umpteen years

I mean

All the Hutu Hawiye Coons

With Kalishnikovs

With no Korans!

With no Koans

With no Cojones

I mean

All the Nay Neigh-yers

I mean

All the Blind Mouths

Who strain at a gnat and swallow a camel

I mean

The Good

The Evil

The Ugly

I mean

The Fugly

The Phony

The Fake

The False

I mean

The Freaks

The Frauds

The Frets

I mean

The old Farts

I mean

The fantasists full of fatude

I mean

The Fools

The Fatheads

I mean

The Fanatic

The Fantastic

The Fabulous

I mean

The Fantabulous

I mean

The Floozy

The Fizgig

I mean

The Fearful

The Frightful

The Ferocious

I mean

The Affreux

I mean

The Fanculo

I mean

The Fainéant

I mean

The Funny-in-the head

I mean

The Not-So-Funny-in-the head

I mean

The Good-For-Nothing

I mean

The Know-Nothing

Like dishonest Dubya

I mean

The Goof-Off

Like Qurunle Qanyare

I mean

The Jerk-Off

Like Ina Aideed

I mean

The Sage

The Silly

I mean

The Saint

The Sinner

I mean

The Munafaqeen of Mog

I mean

All the Hajji Harams of Hargayssa

 The Unhappy Hypocrite whores of Hargayssa

I mean

Les Grands Parleurs Petits Faiseurs of Somalia

Mom

Why do all Somalis

And I mean all Somalis

Bar none

Why do all Somalis call themselves

Moslems

Mom

Does just mouthing the words 

I am a Moslem

Make me Moslem

Mom

Does just praying five times a day

Like you

Like dad

Make me Moslem

Mom

Does just fasting the month of Ramadan

Like you

Like dad

Make me Moslem

Mom

Does just taking a short and sharp shopping trip to Mecca

Like the old rank rich roués of Arabia make me Moslem

Mom

Does just merely going through the motions of a Moslem make me Moslem

Mom

How did Da-Mean Motiveless Malice come to mean

Moslem

Mom

How did

Fitna

Fatwa

Faqri

Come to mean

Moslem

Mom

How did IBM

(I)nshaa-Allah: meaning never ever!

(B)ukra: meaning mañana(the manna of Banana Republics)

& give this sorry sucker the run-around

(M)a-alesh: meaning go fuck a duck for all I care

How did this irate and outrageous IBM

Come to mean

Moslem

Mom

What is a Moslem

Who is a

Cross my heart and hope to die

So help me God

Dyed-in-the-wool Moslem

Like you

Like Malcolm Little

Like Malcolm X

Like El-Hajj Malik El Shabazz

I mean

A Moslem

For sure

For real

For good

For honest-to-goodness

For honest-to-God

For keeps

Forever

For come hell or high water

Or

Dumdum Da-Mean Dubya in Fallujah

Mom

When is a Moslem most

Like Moslem

Like you

Like Malcolm X

Like Michael Mariano

Like Merlin Russell Grove

Like Helen Rank

I mean

Like the real McCoy

Mom

What is your last word on being Moslem

What is your definitive definition of Moslem

Mom

Give me the inside dope on being Moslem

I mean

Give me the genuine real goods on being Moslem

Mom

Who is a Moslem for real

What is a Moslem for real

—Mandhow!

Mahamud!

Boss-tay-ye!

A Moslem is

Anyone

Anywhere

In God’s great wide world

Who gives you

Who gives his neighbor

Who gives

All God’s creation

All God’s creatures

Great & small
PEACE

Peace

From his mouth

Peace

From his heart

Peace

From his hand

For the Lord God made us all

To enjoy Peace

With Him first

And then

With all that Allah has created

I mean

The Peace of God

That passes all understanding                                                           

I mean

The Peace that makes me

Like my late dad

Like Siyad Togane

Sing out loud

“Awada Jàw Abgal!

I mean

The Peace that makes me

Like Adan Abdulle Osman

Like Farah Gololay

Sing out loud

Behold!

How good!

How pleasant!

It is

For Somali brothers

For Somali sisters

To dwell together

In Peace

In Unity

In "bonds of affection

And the mystic chords

Of our shared Somali memory";

Born of "the better angels of our nature"

In the bloodless bonds of Peace.

NOTES

Adan Abdulle Osman: The first democratically elected president of Somalia (1960-1966); the first African president who did not declare himself president for life but walked away peacefully and manfully from power like Saint Nelson Mandela.

Affreux: (French) The horrible ones.

Aideed: Or Aidiid. General Mohamed Farah Aideed, also known as General Wow of  Black Hawk Down notoriety; the thug that mugged and kicked Uncle Sam and his  UN out of Somalia; once he was the top Somali banana who drove Somalia and the rest of the world bananas. Aideed was the scourge of the Darod; the thug that tarred and feathered and ran Sa-eed Samatar out of town on a rail in an American tank with the whole world watching agog on Larry King Live and on CNN and on BBC and on ABC and on CBC and on CBS and on PBS and on the Toronto Royal Loyal Habar Gidir Broadcasting Castration Center of Gûn Darod Clans!

Aideed simply couldn’t stand Sa-eed because Sa-eed who was then consultant for Ted Kobel of ABC happened to be a disagreeable Darod. Aidiid was simply impossible to deal with:

In my report back

To the Moslems

To the Mennonites

To the Somalis

To the Canadians

To the Americans

To the Europeans

To all the friends of the Somali people

Who had sent me on that fateful dangerous Peace Mission

To Aideed

To Mogadishu

In 1992

I wrote:

It is maktoob now:

It is written now

That there are now three likely scenarios in Somalia

(1) For Somalis

To crown Aideed with the royal diadem

To crown Aideed

King of all the Somali clans!

(2) Or for Somalis

To unite and kick crazy Aideed out of Somalia

To keep the Darod Kalab Afwayne company!

In Nigeria!

To unite and kick crazy Aideed out of Somalia

Just like they had done it 

To the dirty Darod despot

Just like they had kicked Afwayne out of Somalia

All the way to Nigeria

(3) Or for Somalis

To kill the SOB Aideed right there

Where he is

In his Hutu Hawiye Nuthouse!

In Moriyan-Mad Max Mogadishu!

That made my audience clamor and cry out:

“Togane

Prophesy!

Play Tiresias

Play the part of the Blind Prophet of ancient Greece

The most famous soothsayer of ancient Greece

You are the man

You were there

You suffered

You saw Aideed

You nearly lost your life four times

Before you encountered

The Hutu Hawiye hero

Aideed

&

His Abgal nemesis

Ali Mahdi

Of the three scenarios you had cited

Which one is the most likely to come to pass?  

Afwayne, the spiritual Papa Doc of Aideed, had the sense

To say

To himself

To his dreadful Darod confederacy:

‘You are intelligent,

What better alternative is there

But run away from the wrath of the Hutu Hawiye Hordes!

To Nigeria

Where nigger dictators like me

May micturate away their last days

In peace!’

And then Papa Afwayne split from the obscene scene of Mad Max Mog!

How will the Hutu Hawiye hero end up?

How will he meet his Maker?

Will he too like Afwayne cheat Somali justice

And split from the senseless Somali scene he perpetrated?”

—I stood up and delivered this prophesy:

The Hutu Hawiye hero is a heel!

The Hutu Hawiye hero is a hellion!

The Hutu Hawiye hero is a hellhound

The Hutu Hawiye hero won’t have enough sense

To run away to Nigeria from the wrath of the Hutu Hawiye Hordes!

The Hawiye hero will go down

In a hail of bullets from a Hawiye Kalishnikov

Right there in Mogadishu!

Four years later the words of Togane

The Somali Tiresias

Came to pass!

On August 2 1996

Mohamed Farah Aydiid

Danced to bullets

Danced his last

Danse macabre

Sic transit Gloria mundi Hutu Hawiye Habar Gidir Jalaf!

Thus passed away the glory of the Hutu Hawiye Habar Gidir Jalaf!

Thus passed away the hour of the glory of the Hutu Hawiye Habar Gidir Jalaf!

Thus Aideed & his Hawiye Habar Habar Gidir Jalaf snatched defeat

Out of the jaws of victory!

Thus Aideed & his Habar Kintir killed the whole crazy concept called

Hawiye!

Aideed was gardeed & gardeed wa Allah deed: One who refuses and rejects and tries to refute the result of the consensus decision-making of the Moslem community: the will & the wisdom of Allah and his Prophet who taught his Ummah: “My community will never agree upon an error"

See page 232 of Lewis. A Pastoral Democracy: A Study of Pastoralism & Politics Among the Northern Somali of the Horn of Africa. London: Oxford University Press, 1961.

Finally Aideed heard the music of the only language that he dug; the language of Mugdi Mudug where he hails from; the language of Bud iyo laan: cudgel& stave for he got his overdue comeuppance on August 2, 1996 when he ran heedlessly (as it was his wont) into a hail of bullets.

The trophy of this triumph goes to the clannish confederacy of convenience of Atto’s Rer Hilowle & the Da-ood Abgal warlord, Al-hajji Muse Soodi Yalahow, whose clan Aideed held in utter contempt for Aideed & his Habar Gidir just couldn’t envision Somalia under the leadership of “Ali Diesel & his bovine Abgal & their donkeys.”

Aideed’s legendary mulish mad stubbornness began in arrogant ignorance and ended in his unregrettable and unlamented demise!

Rira bien qui rira le dernier: He who laughs last, laughs best!

Awada Jàw Abgal!: (Somali) Only tonight do I deign to call myself an Abgal! Siyad Togane’s celebrated and inspired salvific retort to the Italian imperialist’s impudent policy of divide and rule and to their crazy clannish question of

“Are you Dir Darod Dayoos Danyer or Doqon?”

His riposte while under duress; while under torture; thus repudiating the crazy claims of his bovine Abgal clan on his integrity & dignity as a free Somali citizen, as an autonomous individual who does not belong to Aideed’s Hawiye herd.

That was the practical beginning of the revolutionary time of the SYL consciousness of the Somali race. A time for every Somali to deny the crazy claims of the Somali KKK —Dir Darod Dayoos Danyer Doqon— upon him; a time to deny & eschew the anachronistic evil of clanism (the most insidious sort of racism) & affirm friendship; a time to betray one’s clan rather than one’s friends who are the medicine of life.

Needless to say that time is right now!

Togane’s SYL past was only the prologue to the present of this Somali generation and many more generations to come. 

Blind Mouths: An apt and memorable syncohdeche from Milton’s Lycidas, 1. 119; a fitting phrase for the greedy guts and crazy coons like Qurunle Qanyare and Aideed fils (Tel père tel fils: Like father, like son) who now pose as leaders of Somalia.

Boss-tay-ye: (Somali) My Somali mother’s pet name for me that means the champ who puts chumps in their proper place.

Caliban: A deformed savage from Shakespeare’s Tempest: in this context I mean a primitive brute aptly and memorably described by Kipling as “Half devil and half child” in his White Man's Burden.

Damean: A dullard loaded like a Darod donkey with dollars like Dubya.

Dubya: The Village Idiot in the White House who won re-election on the mindless slogans of—Four More Years! And of—USA! And on the tactics of Fear & Smear! "Never underestimate the bad taste of the American public." 

Dubya was re-elected by what the great American H.L. Mencken  called,  Boobus Americanus: “The ignorant, self-righteous, and overly credulous Bible Belt know-nothing, go-getting middle-class philistines whom he also dubbed the "booboisie."

Faqri: (Arabic) The needless Poverty of the Moslem World.

Farah Gololay: The Oscar Wilde of Somalia; the monarch of Somali wit & waggery; the son of savvy and suavity and savoir-faire who is now in Paradise with Allah for merely making Somalis laugh during the dark days of the Dirty Darod Dictator alias Papa Doc Afwayne.

Fatude: (Somali) “…sincere delusions—that is, lies which the liar believes.”

See page 235of John Berryman. Recovery. New York: Farar, Straus and Giroux, 1973.

A chip-on-the-shoulder delusional attitude informed by ignorance & arrogance. A Somali word meaning an attitude struck & stuck in the high lazy latitudes of the doldrums of the doo-doos of self-deception.

Faude is a child “of an idle brain, / Begot of nothing but vain fantasy...” See Romeo & Juliet . 1. iv. 97-98. It is a typical Somali Mugdi Mudug attitude of bullshit & bluster.  The English tongue has borrowed many a word from the Somali tongue, such as yahoo, nag, ninny, seal, was, goose, fug, etc. I predict the English language will soon appropriate  fatude. It is just a matter of time before it too begins to roll off the English tongue just like yahoo. See “A Short lesson In Comparative Languages”, p. 5 of M. S. Togane. The Bottle & The Bushman: Poems of The Prodigal Son. Ste-Anne de Bellevue (Québec): The Muses’Company, 1986. Fatude aptly describes the common Somali affliction of disconnection from reality. It also means a rude, crude attitude based on farce and according to Alfred Kazin, “Farce is catastrophe without a context and without a solution.”

A perfect description & definition of the Somali syndrome & the malady of Mog.

See page 95 of Alfred Kazin. God & the American Writer. New York: Alfred A Knopf, 1997.

Fatwa: (Arabic) An arbitrary ruling by a fanatic humbug of a bully (like the late and unlamented Ayatollah of Iran) who forgot that “philosophy consists in asking questions, sophistry in answering them, and fanaticism in enforcing the answers.”

Fitna: (Arabic) The endless endemic conflicts of the Moslem world.

Galayrd: (Somali) An eagle. Also the name of one of the most astute politicos on the Somali scene today: Dr Ali Khaleef Galayrd, Somalia’s own Dr Kissinger, who would kiss any powerful derriere regardless of how dirty it is; who was the Prime Minister (2000-2001) of the Transitional National Government concocted by die-hard underling dogs of Afwayne in Arta, Djibouti. His critics call this Somali Iago, not an eagle but gier-eagle, meaning a vulture that is half-Harvard, half-hustler. Ali khaleef Galayrd, a Dhulbahante vulture to the Hawiye eagle, Ina bad mad sad Salad Boy, was the prime minister of Somalia for a season or so; a post that he had bought & paid for in the 2000 powwow of Somali rainmakers in Arta, Djibouti. He could afford to buy & pay for the position on the spot because during the kleptocracy of Afwayne, he was the Minister of Industry and Commerce & absconded with millions of dollars earmarked for the construction of sugarcane plantations & factories. No wonder I had dubbed him & his so-called cabinet as Ali Baba Galayrd & his forty thieves!

Galayrd’s PhD, like so many African PhDs , means “poverty, hunger, and disease”. (“They should let us determine out leaders, not those two monsters—Doctor John Garang and Doctor Riek Machar,” one Sudanese spat out scornfully when I asked his view, “In the SPLA, the ones making all the mistakes are these so-called Ph.D.s—poverty, hunger and disease.”)  See page 224-225 of  Scott Peterson. Me Against My Brother : At War  In Somalia, Sudan, And Rwanda: A Journalist Reports From The Battlefields Of Africa. New York: Routledge, 2000

Irony of all ironies, Galayrd’s doctoral dissertation was Beauracratic Corruption in Developing Countries: A Comparative Analysis & Conceptual Inquiry. Apparently Ali Baba Galayrd did his theoretical work of rampant corruption in Nigeria and in Academia that came to fruition in his real practical practice of the real Qurun or corruption in Somalia.

Hajji Harams: All the cunning connoisseurs of all that is forbidden by the Abode of Al-Islam.

Helen Rank: An American Mennonite missionary teacher who served in Somalia from 1961-1976. Helen’s famous last words in an American hospital were: “Take me out of here! You are spending thousands of dollars a day just to keep me alive while a Somali cannot even afford to buy an aspirin. It is obscene; take me out of here! I want to go home and lie down and die just like Somalis do in Mog.”

Hirab: (Somali) The Abgal and their brother clan, the Habar Gidir, are collectively known as Hirab.

Ina Aideed: Hussein Aideed, the son of the late Hutu Hawiye Mad Hatter General Wow.

Kalaabeen: (Arabic) Meaning dogs; singular, kalab. In the lexicon of Somali bigotry & hatred, the worst thing that a mad malicious medieval Somali mullah maddened by modernity can call you are: Kalab! Meaning dog! Or Gaal! Meaning a heathen honky alien infidel! Or Yahood! Meaning a Jew!

Koans: Zen  parables.

Les Grands Parleurs Petits Faiseurs: (French) Great talkers of the Word and small doers of the Word.

Malcolm Little: Malcolm Little metamorphosed into Malcolm X only to apotheosize into the immortal El-Hajj Malik El Shabazz.

Mandhow: (Somali) My son.

Merlin Russell Grove: Merlin Russell Grove of Markham, Ontario, was martyred on July 16, 1962, by a Muslim muttonhead from Mugdi Mudug. Merlin laid down his life for me and for his friends in Africa and North America and “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”

Michael Mariano: See my poem, “The Avatar of the Somali Race”, on the mudulood.com.

Munafaqeen (Arabic) Hypocrites.

Qurunle Qanyare: The bully boy Poo-Bah of the Afar-Qoable clan.

Stubbornness: My mother, quoting the hadith of the Prophet always admonished me, “Mandhow, Avoid stubbornness, for it begins in ignorance and ends in regret.”                                           

Ummah: The great Moslem nation of more than 1.200 billion,

                                  Mahamud Siad Togane