In dem folgenden Gedicht läßt der Autor Yusuf Kassam einen alten Mann seine Erinnerungen an den
Maji-Maji-Krieg ausdrücken.
- Sitting on a stoole outside his mud hut
- The mzee scratched his head in a slow motion,
- Trying to recall
- His dim grey eyes quiveringly stared into the distance
- And with a faint foltering voice he spoke
- Of the wind that stirred sinister feelings
- Of the leaves that rustled with forebording,
- Of the men who talked of deliverance and freedom,
- And of the warriors who pledged to fight.
- Then he paused and snuffed some tobacco
- "The Germans" He shook his head and shuddered:
- "Yes, they came - with guns, to be sure -
- Many guns."
- His glance slowly shifted in a broken semi-circle
- At each of the few listeners who squatted on the ground.
- He pointed to the distant hills on his right:
- "For many days,
- They resounded with drum-beats and frenzied cries;
- Then with the spirit of alien ancestors
- They thundered with strange unearthly sounds."
- Placing both his hands on his head,
- He looked down on the earth and pronounced,
- "They fired bulls, not water, no, not water."
- He looked up, with a face crumpled with agony,
- And with an unsteady swing of his arm, he said,
- "Dead, we all lay dead."
- While the mzee paused, still and silent,
- His listeners gravely looked at each other
- Seeming to echo his last words in chorus.
- Finally, exhausted, he sighed,
- "The Germans came and went,
- And for many years
- No drums beat again."