//------------------------------//
// Movement 5 - Climb 
// Story: The Ballad of Maelewano 
// by Rambling Writer 
//------------------------------//

A folklore hero Maele was
In sooner than a year.
Her challenge sent across the plains
Rang loud for all to hear:

“You quaggas cannot hope to hold
These lands with all your powers.
We may be down, but we’re not out!
This land’s not yours; it’s ours!”

Slowly tribes did coalesce
Around this rallying cry.
Their hope returned, they struck right back
Against those they despised.

But these new tribes still clung onto
The zebra ways of old
With hierarchies, rivals, castes;
They could not hope to hold.

For when a single aim they lacked,
Then quarrels did soon grow.
Who played what role, which bloodline ruled,
To whom might was bestowed.

So Maele drew in tribes so weak
They’d nothing left to lose
But greater tribes, more powerful,
Were not quite so enthused.

And still the Mbu swiftly grew,
By leaps and bounds and more.
In fact, their numbers grew so great
That leading was a chore.

Few Mbu zebras had been chiefs;
Experience they lacked.
And Maele, although many things,
Could not lead such a pack.

Moqapi a solution found,
Bade Maele take some mares
To an oasis in their range
And hold the water there.

All zebras tribes who stopped by there
Could drink without a price.
But “please take up the Mbu’s form”
Was given as advice.

No loyalty was wanted
And so none was ever asked.
But Maele said much would be gained
If they annulled the castes.

They’d work for all, and all would work;
So each would find their place.
A tribal life should not be like
Competing in a race.

Some tribes of open thought and mind
Soon reworked all their roles
Although they had been in these parts
Since they had been but foals.

They found, without assumptions made,
The whole tribe’s might increased.
When everyone was listened to,
Their skills were like a feast.

Around the tribes the Mbu taught,
The lands were slowly freed
For bit by bit and foot by foot,
Their strength turned back bare greed.

But as the zebras gathered strength,
The quaggas did the same.
The small uprisings were opposed
As bandits upped their game.





Bililiqada was a quagga
Plundering the plains.
(I know, that name’s a mouthful great.
From saying so, refrain.)

She took her loot where’er she could
And from the weak she stole.
She had no kindness, empathy,
Or warmth within her soul.

She’d settled once for merely theft;
But as the tribes struck back,
In kind she did retaliate
And headed harsh attacks.

When she once lost a small few slaves
Thanks to a zebra raid,
She hounded them for seven weeks
And had those zebras slain.

A wrathful brute Bilili was,
A bully and a thug.
She knew of Maele’s influence
And called out for her blood.

“Those zebras won’t be so courageous
If their hero’s dead!
Great wealth to one who tracks her down
And brings to me her head!”

Within the bandits, hunters fierce
Did whet their knives and spears.
With chasers nipping Maele’s heels,
Her death might soon be near.





But Maele knew not of this plot
To bring the zebras down.
She stayed at the oasis cool
And spread her word around.

One day, a ragged tribe of old
Came to that place of peace.
And Maele, shocked, did recognize
Kiburi as their chief.

Her former tribe had clung to life
Across their roving range.
But as the zebras weathered on,
Kiburi’s face had changed.

Her trials long had hardened her
And left her mind so cold.
Although she stood, the years of stress
Now made her look so old.

When Maelewano welcomed her,
Kiburi turned away.
She was withdrawn and would not hear
What Maele had to say.

“What you decry is all we know,”
Kiburi said to her.
“It’s served us well as one could hope.
It is what we prefer.”

Now, Maele never would agree
To what Kiburi said,
So she appealed to what she knew
To get inside her head.

“You’ve aged so much e’er since we split;
Your stripes are turning gray.
But would you rather not prefer
To give that stress away?

You’re only chief because you think
It’s what your bloodlines wanted.
But I can see it in your eyes;
You’re by your choices haunted.

Some other zebra could be chief
(And better at it, too)
If you but listen to my words
And see that they are true.”

Kiburi, though, would not give up
What’d served for years and miles.
She still accepted Maele’s pleas
To stay and rest a while.

Out on the plains, with bandits ’round,
Kiburi had no peace.
And so, a scant few quiet days
Provided some release.

With no responsibilities,
That night quite well she slept.
And yet this peace could not last long;
She realized this and wept.

But she was from a warrior line;
She could not be so soft.
She held her tears, she hid her thoughts,
She left with head aloft.

Those mem’ries did not fade away,
But stayed, so strongly felt.
And as Kiburi dwelled on them,
Her heart began to melt.





Bilili’s hunters idled not
As the Mbu still grew.
They watched the pool where Maele stayed
And when her guards were few.

Like she had done those years ago,
They struck in dead of night.
They massacred the standing guards
And set the camp alight.

While Maele did evade her death
By some great stroke of luck,
Her only option was to flee
From quaggas run amok.

The scant few zebras that escaped
Were scattered to the winds.
Though Maele lived, they’d lost the pool.
For bandits, ’twas a win.

Bilili killed her prisoners;
She had no need of slaves.
She swore that, with her own bare hooves,
She’d dig out Maele’s grave.

And Maelewano was alone,
Within these plains so vast.
She knew not where the Mbu were
Or where camp had been cast.

And some few hunters tracked her still,
The brightest and the best.
With such a constant threat behind,
She barely stopped to rest.

From her old hills she was cut off;
She made a desperate plan
To lose them with a lengthy loop
Around the zebra lands.

She stayed away from common trails
Where quaggas often trod,
But hugged the desert, parched and dry;
She’d never felt so hot.

But on she ran, and all alone.
The odds said she would die.
But on she pressed, and so the odds
Were turned into a lie.





Moqapi did return one day
With Maele’s camp in ruin.
Soon rumors flew of Maele’s death
Though this had not been proven.

But to imagine was not hard;
Bilili’s taunt rang out:
“She cannot run! She cannot hide!
Her death I’ll bring about!”

So no one knew, this way or that.
Nowhere was Maele found.
Was freedom hers? Or was she dead?
Was she by quaggas bound?

Morale of zebras, once so high,
Did slowly start to dwindle.
None were like Maele, it appeared,
Who zebras’ hope could kindle.

And all this news, Kiburi heard.
Her feelings were at war.
She had ensured her tribe was safe
But she’d done nothing more.

But Maelewano was well-known,
A hero to the herds.
For all she’d done, Kiburi finally
Thought upon her words.

Then after thinking night and day,
She knew just what to do.
Kiburi turned her tribe around
To seek out the Mbu.

For Maele’s friendship she remembered;
Help she had to find.
She saw her acts had been so rash
And stress had made her blind.

One night she gathered all the clan,
Made great apologies.
“I’ve done you wrong. My rule is poor.
You need a better chief.

Now, if you think you could do more,
Your thoughts might be correct.
My title false I now rescind.
A new chief, please elect!”

Although this caused a mighty stir,
Nozebra thought her wrong.
Debate ensued; they soon picked out
A mare whose will was strong.

And so the tribe reorganized,
By Maele’s ways remade.
Kiburi went back to the role
That long ago she’d played.

As she picked up her spear again,
She’d never felt so free.
She need not rule. She need not lead.
A warrior she would be.