Magnificent Splendour

Splendour. Tiny waves lapping - not crashing - against the shore. Toes digging deep into grainy sand. Sweaty hands on the face of a rock, knees bent, body heavy. Squinting in response to the glare as a large glint of sunshine pokes through a thick grey cloud. Splendour. Not a child's laugh, but the throaty giggle made when defenses come down in front of a lover. The sound of the black keys piercing gently through the white when a piano is played. What a daisy looks like when held up against the blue sky. The sun bouncing off your best friend's eyelashes. Sharp canine's sparkling as you throw your head back in laughter. Splendour. Sensory seduction at the birth of spring. Swallows in a swoop above pylons at dusk. The light touch of your sand papery palms on my cheek. Splendour.

Gift from the Sun

Does it make you feel
powerful? This distancing
you do. Withdrawing from
the full brightness of the sun,
not to hide in shade - or rest -
but to enclose yourself in
a molehill of experience.

Don't you know that the sun's
sole purpose is to highlight the
vivid blue of the sea thrashing itself
against that one jagged cliff. Gifting
you with the luxury of watching it
from above - or immersing
yourself in it forever.

Monsters sans masks

My eyes
were stitched
closed
so that I could
not see
the perpetrators
of the wounds

A thousand
paper cut
lacerations
stung
deeply -
everywhere

Confused -
unable to
make sense
of where they
came from

Not realising they
were there
until I felt
them come
alive with
the lifeblood
of a hot burn
days later

Bathing them
in salt water -
solitary - until they
would heal. It
became ritual -
Recovery

Then one day -
body
piercing all over -
My hands reached
up of their own
volition

And picked each
stitch carefully
from
my eyes - Pus
oozing out through
scabs and crusts

Lids heavy, my
retina adjusted.
The slime
coagulated
to the bottom

And for the first
time I saw their
truly
hideous faces
and set myself
free

Ma (Grandmother)

Your cataracts blinded
you from seeing what
your son had
become. The torment
he inflicted on the
five women
in his
life.

Your big curly white hair,
wild and unruly, like your
spirit in the face of
late night screaming
matches.

The FBI are not after you,
mummy, he would say.
No-one is trying to steal
your identity.

My teenage
angst led only to
anger. Seeing you
as a burden.

I sit here, in wonder,
at the woman you
must have been.

What it took for you to
raise a house full of children,
a child yourself, a victim of
a bearded patriarch with a red
hot staff in his hand.

His death, leaving you with nine
mouths to feed, then their
premature deaths.
Rebellious entitled sons.

If only you lived another life.
I like to imagine your potential.
Then I remember that you
do. Through me.

Not for a second, do I forget
that my life started in
your womb.

Letter to my (broken) beloved

I knew you, from before
the moment you tottered

taking your first steps

toward your mama. 

I followed you, a 

bird perched on your 

shoulder, chirping

as you picked up

the scissors to cut your

hair yourself. Little 
hands trembling. 

I held you. By the 
arms, stopping you
pulling brows from
your face, only moments 
after your first fight 
with sweet Adele. 

I never left your side when

you immersed yourself in the

joyous pleasures of young 

adulthood. Waiting for you

to return home so I could stroke 

your hair, and wipe the expired 
mascara from beneath your eyes. 

Then, when you stumbled over

your own feet into your first 
true love I drew arcs over 

your head with my toes,
making a halo for you.You 
never needed to look up,

but I was always there. 

And I’ll be there - I am 
here - now that that love 
has morphed into nothing 
more than the withered root 
of an orchard still attached to

beautiful but

already dead blooms.

Rage (Part I)

Head heavy. Cranium
full of lead. Frontal
cortex bursting
with pressure.
Rage.
Fills my body.

Rage. From the
numbness in the tips
of my fingers to
the roots of the
ache in my lower
back.  Rage. Is the
sound of the scratched
echo that plays
inside me.

Rage. At the thieves
who've stolen my
emotional land. At
those oblivious
to the difficulties
of our condition.
At those who
dare to be
their authentic
selves without
consequence.

Rage. At the
injustice of this
affliction.
Rage. At it all.

Except
there is
no rage
towards
my melanin.

The Opening

I have
never
felt
a
vulnerability
like
this
before.

A listless
ache
behind my
eyes
and a raw
opening of
every
door
inside me.

People
wandering
through
the corridors
of my soul
while I watch
from below.
Mute.

Emptiness
follows their
footsteps as
I float
ceaselessly
through
space.

The Rose Garden

I stood naked on the 

ground, feet sinking into

the sponge of the dewy

grass. He met me there

and sprinkled the seeds

around me, in a loose circle.

We agreed to water it

together

The sun set on that 

summer and the roots

that sprouted began to 

spread. with each sun

set and rise millimeters

of green veins were

added. We learned that 

for the roses to flourish 

they would need support

so we added a metallic 

arch over my head - naked 

body still enduring seasonal

shifts

With autumn came the first

buds, the bloom glorious.

Tiny blushing drops eventually 

spread open, filling my nostrils with 

the scent of molasses. My thighs 

and hips were covered in dustings 

of nectar as he pruned, watered

and tended to the new born

sprouts

It continued this way - and 

by the seventh cycle the archway

was laden with the weight of 

roses so dense that a single

flower

would weigh down 

the cup of your palm

As the garden flourished, I kept

looking up in awe of the beauty 

that we nurtured, only rarely ever

taking note of the large and heavy vines

that entwined around my waist 

and breasts, coiled around my feet -

cramping  my calves and aching my

back

It was a byproduct of the beauty, 

a cost at which the garden came. 

In the winter I even took solace in

the tight green shelter - it offered

welcome protection from the frosty cold. 

I was safe.

But all this time, I failed to see that

as the roses grew so too did the jagged,

thick and sturdy thorns. Blinded by the

velvet plush petals, it took me by surprise

how the thorns stealthily grew so large

that they barely noticeably pierced their way 

through my rib cage, puncturing my lungs.

Making it

              impossible 

                               for me 

                                          to breathe.

Emmanuel

He stood
beneath the street lamp
in broad day light
jeans, if you could call them that
aged from all wear and no wash, day
after day, to the point where
the jeans - which were
once blue - were as gray as
the dreads atop his head as
the trainers which bled
crusted feet from the sides, as
the oversized utility jersey
he wore.

He talked
in tongues. Sporadic teeth brittle
and gray too -a mad man  -
except he was not mad.
Everyone else was. Everyone
had driven him to this, the
white Range Rover revved passed
and the ghost inside it didn't half
look up to notice either the street
lamp or the thing
beside it.

Thing.
A man with a face, a
soul, a name - once a child
with love and a tinge of
mischief in his heart.
The ghosts took
it out of him. Killed him
slowly, without the reprieve of
death. Stole his dreams so that
the only dream he had was the
nightmare of living
once he came down from
three days ago's tik.

He may have had a child
or three - two girls and
a boy, but the mother
took them back to the Eastern
Cape where they could have had
a better life - less corrupt she said,  less
of the evil Sattan of this city.
(One wondered if she was referring
to the ghosts, who trolled the
streets opulently - probably not. No-one
saw these ghosts as satanic. Not even
he. He never questioned their existence.)
He listlessly conceded to her choice
one Sunday afternoon, half mumbling
half shouting at her while
foaming at the mouth - knowing he
was unable to stop them from leaving.

He continued his monologue -
no-one listened. Not even the street
lamp, or the gray walls surrounding
the newly laid tennis courts or
the street.

I watched for fifteen minutes, then left.

Cape Town Haiku

The mountain is cursed -
here poor black bodies lie strewn
while rich whites chink glass.

A Feminist Becoming (A Sonnet)

I sat down on the classroom floor
and beneath the desk crossed my knees
Burly, he burst through the door
and sat down across from me
Moulah, I asked, is it possible for a man
to rape his wife
No, he replied, how could he when
he has complete ownership of her life

But he owns her not, she has full agency,
I pleaded to reason for him to realise
Despite, my cries he could not see
that a woman her own man maketh, is no guise
In that moment, I could not breathe or see - I became numb
even though, I now know, I did a feminist become

My lovers want to know if I will write blogs about them

My
lovers
want to
know if
I will
write
blogs
about them

Do you
have
the hands
of God
himself,
I ask

A light
touch
that can turn
silk to stone
to silk

Or illuminate
the crevices
of the
deepest
darkest
cavern

Or
perhaps,
like the ocean -
lap up
my ankles
and entwine
yourself
around them
weightlessly
as you crash

moving from
everything
to a soft
wet
nothing
in an instant

If so, I
will
write
every blog
about you

Perfect earth

In a perfect world,
   walks on the beach
would culminate in
   toes covered in sand
   and a soul raked through
   silken shores

In a perfect world,
    staring at the sun
would mean
    our glory being
    reflected right back
    to it
with equal splendour

In a perfect world,
   a baby's laugh
   would reverberate
   through every suburb
ringing the
   meditation bell of joy
   in every man's heart

In a perfect world,
   the leaf that falls
   from the tree at autumn's
   first breath,
would land so softly that
  we would all feel a feather
  dust the side of our temple

In a perfect world,
   the almost silent drumming
   of rains
would quell all our fears.
    For eternity.

Gulls

His heart
ran
loops
around his head

So that
he couldn't tell
the sound of the seagull
from the sea

Or the smell of freshly
baked baguette
from the charm of the
french woman
who handed
it to him
over the counter

He lived in
iterations -
of himself, of
his story, of his
perception
of the world

And so many times
seagulls had almost
eaten bread
from his
bare hands,
but didn't

Lily

Her fingers
parted
the soft folds
of her
malleable molten maze

The warm
scent
of liquid
silk
radiated off her
finger
tips

She didn't know
at which point she
closed
her eyes
and felt

a thousand worlds collide
into a single
exaltation

all seven skies
compress
into
a pin prick of
splendour

a veil lift
from the
heavens

and a breeze
blow
over
her face

Spirals

So it ended. the relationship, that is. It's a tricky thing to write about without sounding self-indulgent and clichéd. It is a tumultuous space. One that liberates but confines equally. I found myself waking up to the prospect of a new life, a new-old life, that is boundless and infinite. I also found myself curling into a ball on the floor and wailing, expecting some kind of dramatic ending to the pain - a numbness - but none came. I can't write now. All the creative energy that was given birth to by the freshness of heartbreak has evaporated. Contaminated by the relationships I have tarnished. The men I've sought. The friends I've drained. It isn't beautiful. It isn't poetic - I'm sitting in my car during my lunch hour in a parking lot full of exuberant students, crying, then I'll go back to my desk and try to work pretending nothing happened. Nothing has happened. The clock is ticking, but time isn't passing. This is an infinity. There is circularity to the process. There is no catharsis. Only a returning to and a returning to the same point of departure. Forever.

Mumbi (or Misskim)

She sat across from
me, her moon-lit face
glowing in the faint light
of a winter's day

A goddess incarnate. Made
even more radiant by the
fullness of her belly and the
second heart that beat
inside her

One could not mistake
her for feeble at her worst.
Divinity, she told me tales
about fate and choppers,
about love and kinship

Like an apparition from
the heart of the mountains
of Kenya, born
of a hundred generations of
strong, unbendable women,
she came to me as my saviour
and graced me with the
light touch of her
chi

She is woman
She is what
I strive to be

I kissed her feet

Clay

He seemed like
the kind of guy
for whom
eating pussy
could have easily been
a chore
or his favourite pass-time
it was hard to tell

For that matter,
what gave away whether
a man ate pussy like it was
the last slice of cold
watermelon on a sweltering summer day,
or not?

Actually, perhaps it seemed
like it would be a chore.
He did speak in a way that
revealed enough, but not too
much. Was this calculated?

Everything about him screamed
tenderness. Except his hands,
they proclaimed presence.
What they were used for was
wetting clay and moulding
pots. But are pots not like pussy?
I wondered. I guess they aren't.
After all, they can't feel or respond.

Or perhaps they are, because all they do
is respond.
There is no pretense in pottering.
There should be no pretense in petting,
but petting is all pretense.

Your face is
like the moon
at its fullest.

Radiant and bright
in its scarred glory.

I can't look away.

Settler

What does it feel like
   to be so good at
   everything
   you do?
Paint, create, imagine, invent,
write, construct, calculate,
assess, read, understand,
analyse, synthesise, communicate,
articulate, and even gesticulate.

Success comes so easy
     to you.
You breathe it.
That wild hair, and those
     steel
     eyes don't hurt.
You were born
    for
    this.
You were born
    with
    this
    in your mouth.

This
cost
a hundred-thousand slaves
     lashed
and worked to
     the
     bone,
entire families
     displaced,
forced to
     wander and
     trek,
women - no girls,
barely fifteen -
     raped
and with child
    beaten,
families
    ripped
    apart,
men
    imprisoned,
children,
     left fatherless,
communities
     dispossessed.

You're so good at it all,
     that even you know
     this.

But tell me,
   does it feel good?