#26 (haiku)

yellow petals turning to the sun —
perhaps they think I fear their beauty

What You Wish For..

Deep inside the crevices & labyrinths of my mind
Lair to the secrets you hope to uncover & find
The one’s that catapult create cause commotion
Engaging all my elicit evasive elusive emotion

You wish one day to devoutly dissect
The lullaby’s of my live wired life
The same one’s I whisper when I sleep
Hidden entombed encapsulated inside deep

You will penetrate the depths of my eyes
Attempt to subterfuge all possible lies
Offer to entwine me, envelop me embrace
Together we will conquer the world we will face

I will become your pet project, experiment
The same someone you regretfully learn to resent
You will beg, you will shout, you will plead
Tell me you will evoke the epitome of my need

You will try tear down destroy my fences
Engage my heightened sonar like senses
Compile and offer me a whole set of new rules
Even providing efficient capable custom made tools

The gnawing need persists to know my story
All the pieces, parts in real GPS time glory
To facilitate, to map, mitigate and rationalize
Eradicate secrets, stories, entertain no surprise

You command, corner me, I recoil retreat react
I promised you no secrets and I told you no lies
We made no schoolyard spit or honorable blood pact
No till death do us part nor till one of us dies

…………Tell me Truthfully..do you want my Secrets or Sex?

Fare Thee Well, Madiba

Goodbye, Grand Warrior of Mveso
Of Qunu, of Transkei, of Soweto
Grand Warrior of Rivonia and Robben Island
Goodbye, Grand Warrior of Azania, of Africa
Fare thee well, beloved icon of the World
Fare thee well, resilient Madiba

I speak not with anger though I ought to
I speak not with bitterness though I should
These you banished, Grand Warrior
When you embraced humanity and hope
You battled anger, bitterness and vengeance
You won peace, truth and freedom

And you won Africa and the World
Grand Warrior, you won them all
You won me over, too, Madiba
For while you were on the Isle
Frozen in time and space
Anger and vengeance we embraced

Where are our people? (Silence)
What have you done to our people? (Silence)
Where is the justice for our people? (Silence)
Can silence answer me? (Silence)
What’s that you say? What?
And again they responded with silence.

Why, we asked, why this impunity?
Why pretend to be a Nation
A Nation, that is, without a State?
Was that not, we asked ourselves,
What you were prepared to die for?
What you were frozen in time and space for?

So, anger we seized, arms outstretched
And stoked the fire of vengeance, yes
Many were the casualties, as you know
And much blood was shed and limbs broken
As witness the myriad battles and battlefronts
That turned South Africa into a war zone

Then finally and triumphantly, Grand Warrior
You and the thousands that were incarcerated
For giving voice or limb to our cause
Returned home, Grand Warrior,
As free men and women of a Nation
In need of a leader and a Vision

You gave us that, Grand Warrior
You conquered my anger and my bitterness
You conquered my vengeance, Madiba
You showed the World the way, Madiba
And forged a great nation, the Rainbow Nation
I was there with the happy multitudes

Yet now I must accept the dictates of life
The dictates of humanity, of who we are
You leave us a strong Nation, South Africa
Where we had lived like unwelcome strangers
We are now the proud owners and shapers
Of our collective destiny and inheritance

I know and we all know that your life
Great Son of Hendry and Nosekeni
Descendant of King Ngubengcuka
I say we now know without a doubt
That your life had a great purpose
And your departure a great legacy

How does one mourn a hero of your stature?
How does one mourn a great statesman?
How does one mourn a Grand Warrior?
Except to say you were posted to Azania
That we may see the light and be free
And are now en route to another front?

Go well, my brother, Great Son of Africa
We shall never forget, brother mine,
Carne da mesma carne, sim,
Your call for peaceful coexistence
For we know, my brother, yes, we know
We are in the same South Africa boat.

I want you to know, Madiba, my Brother,
As you embark on your final journey
That millions are distraught to see you go
And that of all those, I am the most distraught.
May your legacy endure throughout the ages!
Goodbye, symbol of our freedom, adeus.

Kiss of death

As you lay in this street,
Your body broken,mangled,
Your blood dripping of my hands,
Bones and intestines on display.
You cannot speak.
Your eyes they beg for release.
My mind understands your plea.
But my heart,
Every thing that is my heart says no.
If it must be mercy,
Then death’s kiss for you,
Must be thunder and flame.
Close your eyes.
Find a better place.
The last sight you see,
Must not be me.
The tears in my eyes,
Blurs my vision.
I place the gun against your head,
Hands shaking.
Hoping my aim is true.
I pull the trigger.
For you.
This will be release.
For me.
This is where my life ends.

Turn left at the stop sign

It left my body
like a slow release of cigarette smoke through parted lips.
I blink my eyes, life goes by in the blink of one.
The flame of the candle flickers,
Green wax and the hum of the heat in my ears.

We paint our souls so that they’re colourful,
we fill in the spaces where the air seeps through
those spaces that are black and white,
because everyone wants to be significant.

They told me: “If you’re grey on the inside
you’ll drift through life like a ghost on water with no reflection
and not even the moon will shine on you.”

I cry out into the night and my tears raise the ocean.
The world is heavy with sighs,
the ground heaves and shudders
and is dirtied by sand-stained feet.

I’m walking on the tired earth with a tired heart
with heavy arms and a stretched soul.
Invisible hands have pulled my head in a million directions,
and I have lost focus.

The tears and the hope and the madness have evaporated into the air
and formed clouds of quiet melancholy that hang over the earth
like dirtied sheets on a clothes line,
blowing back and forth in the wind.