Centre of the World

There’s an image of peaceful solitaire

Thinking back on the countryside air

The fields and my childhood lair

I remember a great fig tree — its still there

Standing many a feet up in the air

In a land no owner known nor heir

Everyone admits they were born and found it there

The vast expanse of land around it bare

And grass of gold, green and fair.

scientists claim the centre of the world I know not where

But I have always thought it to be there

Under that old large dark green stare

Cut it down and the world deflates all its air

Like an unknotted balloon at a county fair

Chainsaw-wielding fiends don’t dare!

A gray Morning and a String Quartet

There is a tidium so great

that has come with this gray weather – –

almost taking the properties of physical weight.

A flu has arrested my wheezing breath

and my teeth chilled from mouth breathing.

I curse the morning

and cross myself with immediate penance.

But until I press play on my record player

does this tedium lift off its weight a while

and Dvorak welcomes me to this new world

This music!

This music heals me!

Calm Her Fears (with audio collab)

I’m delighted to repost this poem from May 2020 with the addition of a spoken word collaboration with Kizito. Make sure you check out his page, he writes brilliantly. Image found here Her Questions: Darling will you still love me when I start to become old when my hair is streaked with grey and the […]

Calm Her Fears (with audio collab)

A beautiful collaboration with the wonderful Bree

Broken Pipe

A water pipe has broken

at a green patch by the road

the grass, the weeds and the wild flowers

probably think it is a spring from the deep

come to save them from all the artificiality.

Some men in blue overalls will soon arrive

and fix the pipe to stop the leak

and the grass, the weeds and wild flowers

will resume their coat of dust and lead.

Zindzile XII

We sat at a roof restaurant in perfect silence

enjoying the view, the company

and the inexpensive juice

You remember?

How could you not.

You came over to my side

and we took pictures cheek to cheek

smiling ear to ear.

.

I printed the picture and stuck it on my wall

Tonight sitting on my hard-knock floor

listening to down and out blues

I stare up at the picture

Your hair short

Your glasses on.

A mosquito has landed just right in the middle of your smile

giving the illusion of gapped teeth.

How much you look like my mama from here

My dear Zindzile — my heart is in the Highlands

My heart is not here

My heart is in the Highlands–my love my dear

Bucephalus

Little rebellious voice inside

That stretch the ends of my wits

threatening the anarchy of passions ;

fears and anxiety

I’ll suffer you

rioting and kicking against the light

I’ll suffer you—

Easy easy easy Bucephalus! —

It’s only your shadow.

Gallop on steady

and let’s conquer the world!

Painted Tulips

I own no flower garden

But here these flowers I bring

Not live but painted

They have no fragrance I know

But see darling they don’t wither

and come in their own vase—

They are not roses

but almost as lovely

They are tulips–

Calm and true

and no thorns on their stalks.

.

illustrated by the poet, soft pastel on paper

Zindzile XI

There’s claw marks on my left arm

thin stripes of scar

that was left on me by my beloved

on the last morning of our parting.

I bear this mark with pride and nostalgia

The only visible mark left on me by love

For you can’t see all the kisses on my lips

Or how my heart has since grown twice its size

.

My scar has been disappearing- my woe

Where was it ever heard

of one mourning the healing of a scar

My dear Zindzile – here on my left arm

it’s like seeing you walk away all over again

Bookmark

Years ago I learnt from a fellow reader

Who did tell of how sacrilegious an act it was

To fold the tips of a book leaf to track pages

So this day I was reading outdoor without my bookmark

I plucked a young hibiscus and with it marked my last page.

.

With nothing else to read today

I picked up the same book again after so long

The flower was dried up where I last left it

It was like a meeting of ex lovers

in their hometown where nothing has changed

And each corner street is achingly depressing

Both burnt out and spit back home by the big city lights.

The Feast of Bacchus

Love comes and sits by me

Love opens a basket of savory goods

inviting me to a feast

But reason has bound my hands on my back

and gagged my mouth with bitter taste

.

Love takes off my gag

kisses off the bile off my lips

Love feeds me— grape by grape

in a bacchanal frenzy

My hands still bound on my back.

.

Illustration, Bacchus by Caravagio