ISSN 2304-8107

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infinite wonders

print quarterly number nine

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Copyright 2016 by Black Letter Media and the respective poets

ISSN 2304-8107

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 Contents
Editorial 4
Poet Muse
Kofi Awoonor 8

Poetry
Kylin Lotter Armour 13
You 14

Ali Znaidi Celestial Illumination 17

Gameedah Riffel Give me a poem please 19

TS Mashile Voices 21

Mighty the Poet My Poetry 23

Tulile Siguca New Dawns 25

Kabelo Mofokeng End of days: SOWETOPHOTOALBUM 27

Double-Doo-Wop 29
Afrika “Khabazela” Mkhize 30

Welcome Moyo Eternal Wonders 33

Amlanjyoti Goswami Star Gazing 35

Soma Bose The Aliens 37

Mercy Dhliwayo Days like these 39

Nkateko Masinga Amagugu 41

Ulrike Kussing My Miracle of 2014 45

Charl Landsberg Tender Heart 47

6
 A Poem A Day 2015 Most Read
Rishan Singh Motto of Life 49

Xabiso Vili “Strangers kiss softly as moths” 50

Sizakele Phohleli the truth about love 51

Tulile Siguca Afrika is Scarred 53

Nqaba Dano A Painful Truth 55

Welcome Moyo Familiar Stranger 57

Tshiamo Modise Ailments 58

Philani Nombika for all that is worth it 59

Zaheera Badat Sleep When You’re Dead 60

Charl Landsberg Fees Must Fall 61

Frank Meintjies Krotoa, Walking Between Worlds 62

Tshepo Mabasa Love 66

Poetry Seen
about 21 Poems 70

Contributors 74

Submissions Guidelines 78

7
 Editorial
To see a world in a grain of sand
And heaven in a wild flower
Hold infinity in the palms of your hand
And eternity in an hour.

Auguries of Innocence, William Blake

What is an eternity in an hour? And can you hold infinity

in your hand? I feel like every poem is such an expression,
something that brings one closer to discovering the
magic of life. Like love:

reached into my chest

caressing each rib
to remove my heart
for safekeeping
in your hands
On the Flipside, Jeannie Wallace McKeown (Poetry Potion
5, 2014)

Like testing freedom:

how much does Africa owe France in taxes

how much does France owe SA for dissecting and slicing Sarah
Baartman
for polishing and showing casing her private parts and butt publicly

temporally free, Rodney Roskruge (Poetry Potion 6,

2014)

Or reaching out for our humanity:

We love and lost, laughed and cried

Conceived and died,
And we acquired life.
4
 Human Nature, Mercy Dhliwayo (Poetry Potion 1, 2013)

A poem is like that grain of sand that can hold a world

in it or just a moment in time. It is a wonder that can be
mis-seen as something exclusive, exclusively belonging
to the dead poets of Europe. Yeah, high school lets us
down sometimes. Because we call know the wonder that
encountering the poems of people with names like yours,
in a language that’s yours and a from a world you come
from, how the infinite wonder belongs to you.

The thing about poetry is that you either feel it or you

don’t. Well, poetry will always make you feel something
even if you’re not sure that you do. Sometimes you have
to read it again or just hear it out loud. Then something
will lift you into a poem and you find yourself moved.

But what was Blake talking about?

In four lines, William Blake presents us, with the finest

of imagery, the beauty of life. “To see a world in a grain of
sand”, Blake calls you to slow down. To stop, and look at
something that we barely every look at. Especially, not
in its singularity. To look at this particular thing, and see
something to vast that even out into space. And “heaven in
a wild flower”, single it out yet see everything contained in
it. That contrast of this imagined place of peace as being
contained in a something wild, typically not seen as
beautiful. This is a powerful line that foregrounds the rest
of the poem and I believe is a beautiful descriptor about
what poems do. He says, look closely, youth “hold infinity
in the palms of your hand / and eternity in an hour”. Whoa, kinda
makes you look at the world in a different way, already
with just this quatrain even before you read the rest of
the poem. It’s interesting that while the rest of Auguries of
Innocence is sometimes arranged in separate couplets and
sometimes as one long stanza. The poem is so much more
but this moment in time, it’s the opening quatrain that
sends us into our theme of Infinite Wonders.

5
With this edition, we get back on track without print
journal programme. The unscheduled interruption that
was 2015 allows us to come back with a journal that is
pack full of new poetry. This is our ninth print quarterly.
With this edition, we go back to publishing in print every
quarter. The new poems in this edition come from all
around the world.

We feature thirteen poets from South Africa, Tunisia

and India. The sixteen poems selected explore Infinite
Wonders using fresh imagery like “Let me behave like tea
drifting into hot water” from Kylin Lotter’s Armor and are
surprising like “The stars were silver like the fake teeth / of an early
twentieth century whore” from Ali Znaidi’s Celestial Illumination.

We have prancing word play, with Kabelo Mofokeng’s

scamtho poetry in End of days: SOWETOPHOTOALBUM, “Sis bhuti
wearing a spoti and botsotso somnganga / how bright your smile looks”
as well as playful words from Amlanjyoti Goswami’s Star
Gazing, “The universe of home, / Suddenly flaps / Its long open wings.”

Some poems itch “Sleepless nights, / Scavenging thoughts, / Eyes

open” like TS Mashile’s Voices; and commanding like My
Poetry by Mighty The Poet, “Let me adore the frightful freedom
with no remorse and drink from this cup of life”.

These poems like Gameedah Riffel’s Give Me A Poem Please

tease you with promises, “I’ll promise you the world / And
whatever wonder your eyes may seek”; while others probe as
Eternal Wonders by Welcome Moyo “Why have we entrusted the
magic to shallow waters?”

They mock like Tulile Siguca does in New Dawns, “The beauty
of any dream is poisoned by the ugly reality of having to awake”, and
they look beyond our orbit like Soma Bose’s The Aliens
does “may be they are robot like machine! / May be, they are human-
alike or of divine doctrine!”.

These poem even stand outside themselves, observing

with curiosity “they are here with their kiss the ground/I am on

6
home soil” in Nkateko Masinga’s Amagugu, or just simply
celebrate something wonderful as Ulrike Kussing does
in My Miracle of 2014, “you unfurled / my sails”. And finally these
poems hope and hold out for something more “I have hope
for one more day / old tender heart of mine” as Charl Landsberg’s
Tender Heart.

As the first edition of the year, I’ve also including a section

of poems that were the most read in the months that
they were published in in 2015. So in total this edition
features 24 poets.

It feels great to be back. Sometimes it takes a lot longer

than planned to make this wheel go round but that best
thing about life is that Poetry Potion still here and here
to stay.

duduzile zamantungwa mabaso

editor, publisher

7
 Poet Muse

Kofi
Awoonor
(poet, author, educator,
ambassador, 1935 - 2013)
critic,

Let me lead you into the country

It is only as half clansman
of the ritual goat

8
 Kofi Awoonor was a Ghanaian poet, literary critic,
professor of comparative literature and a diplomat. His
poetic works drew from and combined the traditions of
the Ewe people as well as contemporary and religious
symbolism .

Awoonor’s grandmother was an Ewe dirge singer,

and the form of his early poetry draws from the Ewe oral
tradition. He translated Ewe poetry in his critical study
Guardians of the Sacred Word and Ewe Poetry (1974) .

In 2013, while attending the Storymoja Festival, a four-

day literary festival in Nairobi, Kenya, Awoonor was killed
while visiting the Westgate Shopping Mall. He was among
those killed in the Al-Shabab terrorist attack. He was with
his son, who was also shot but survived. He was due to
perform at Storymoja that evening and as consequence of
the attack, the festival ended prematurely. In the following
year, 2014, Storymoja held performances in his honour
where a number of the guests from the previous year,
came to participate.

His work includes Rediscovery and Other Poems

(1964), Night of My Blood (1971), Ride Me, Memory
(1973), The House by the Sea (1978), The Latin American
and Caribbean Notebook (1992), and a volume of collected
poems, Until the Morning After (1987). Novels include
This Earth, My Brother… (1971) and Comes the Voyager at
Last: A Tale of Return to Africa (1992). literary criticism
includes The Breast of the Earth: A Survey of the History,
Culture, and Literature of Africa South of the Sahara
(1975)
9
10
Poetry

11
Kylin Lotter

two poems

12
Armour
Let me never be sheltered again.

Let me drown my naivety in my sin.

Let me breathe in the smoke of whim.

Let the flames lick my raw skeleton.

Let me adore the frightful freedom with no remorse and drink

from this cup of life until it cuts my throat and I go hoarse.

Let me see the ugliness. Devour the beauty. I seek to see with
bloodshot eyes the world I was blinded to in my youth.

Let me love you. Let me be in love with you. Stop banging on

my door. Stop breathing in my mind. Stop biting at my skin.

Let me run down corridors in my bare feet and feel the click of
my spine against cotton sheets.

Let me absorb air through osmosis so I never have to breathe.

Let me behave like tea drifting into hot water.

Let me love every syllable of your name.

Let me ask for your permission to be free.

13
You
If I sit very still, can I watch you undress?

If I stapled my feelings to my sleeves and let them hang off me

like cut puppet strings,

would you still watch me get dressed?

but I-

but you, are just a landscape of pale skin stretched over white
bones.

I could spend my days skimming, drifting, with my fingertips

across the dry ice of your subtle flesh.

But I-

just you, with your technicolour eyes that hypnotize the light of
a thousand irises that form our compound mind.

I could cut you off and let you fall, let you float away.

I would blink and you’d be gone in a swirl of historical mist

and then eventually it will just be a memory of a feeling and

presidents would debate if the feeling was ever really real.

We could get married. To different people.

But I-

14
and you will sit across a chess match of desire and sing the
hopeless phrases to mobsters and gods and any one who will
listen because I have something to say and you,

just you,

are not listening.

But I-

just you.

15
Ali Znaidi

16
Celestial
Illumination
Sediment erosion. Dust particles.

Half of the moon was adumbrated by the thick mist.

The stars were silver like the fake teeth

of an early twentieth century whore.

Affluent rain drops came in succession.

An avalanche of translucent mosquitoes waltzing

around the streetlamps.

The moon appeared full & winsome like a bride.

The moon appeared en mode selfie.

—Moments of revelations.

17
Gameedah
Riffel

18
Give me a poem
please
Give me a poem and I’ll change the words for you.
I’ll swop all the letters around while also twisting the truth.
What’s false will now be believed.
What’s wrong will now be true.
Give me poem please and I’ll show you just what I can do.

I’ll show you a world where all your dreams can be reached.
Where infinity is only a number,
Among the many things they teach.

I will put your name in the stars

And scribble it across the sky.
Whatever you want, just ask
And I’ll gladly commit the crime.

I’ll promise you the world

And whatever wonder your eyes may seek.
All you have to do is love me
And I’ll let our imaginations meet.

Give me a poem please

And you’ll have the world at your feet.

19
TS Mashile

20
Voices
Sleepless nights,
Scavenging thoughts,
Eyes open,
Unclear films;
Tomorrow is untold,
We live by the oracle.

Hunger defies the soul,

Presentiments distorts the mind,
Consciousness neglect vessels,
Righteousness falls astray;
These voices has a void to fill.

Blood seemed not lethal,

Guns meant no evil,
Hell’s chuckles broke loose,
Heaven existed not,
Our minds were held captive,
We lived here.

Silence,
We listened accordingly,
Johannesburg was declared our own,
Scampered through the streets,
Loped down our preys,
Cleared throats to flesh,
Preyed on the innocent,
Possessed every breath,
Satisfied the urge;
We found peace in the voices.

21
Mighty the
Poet

22
My Poetry
It speaks to me in the joyful hours and the darkest days, from it
I know how mindful my thoughts are, from the sleepless nights
to the palm of my hand, I know that poetry is my core.

I’d rather be hated for I am, than loved for what I’m not, I live
poetry and it is my rock and a rock never feels pain.

I’ve built a wall, a fortress so deep and might, that non may
penetrate, all I need is my books and my poetry to protect me,
I’m shielded in my armor, hiding in my room, safe within my
heart, I touch no one, and no one touches me.

I don’t do poetry, I don’t speak poetry, but I am poetry, I may be

young but my purpose is the inspiration of a nation.

23
Tulile
Siguca

24
New Dawns
The beauty of any dream is poisoned by the ugly reality of
having to awake

Constantly At the mercy of new dawns, dreams have no real

form just moments made up of too many befores and longing
for more

To write of thee as the girl of my dreams would be an atrocity

You are the only thing real to me, my only tangible reality a
depiction of infinite wanders

The mind is always lost somewhere in the sky

Much of my time lost conversing with stars
At times the sun, she confides in me, confesses that when you
rise and expose the brightness from your eyes all she wants to
do is cover herself behind clouds and hide

It is not only these eyes that can’t comprehend, even to the

goose bumps that attempt to jump out of my skin at the sight of
your beauty infinitely wonder if this can be, if it is just a dream,
a figment of too many fantasies.

Wandering your infinite being has been a journey that saw me

fall deep inside your existence and all I found was love
Filling the cracks, filling the gap

Feeling your smile show off the gap a s dawn cracks open my
heavy eyes is a moment archived with many others that never
saw the light of day

Dreams that live in hope to be real some day

25
Kabelo
Mofokeng
three poems

26
End of days:
SOWETOPHOTOALBUM
Sis bhuti wearing a spoti and botsotso somnganga
how bright your smile looks
in that Aces-mealie-meal-top
SOWETOPHOTOULBUM
let each smile of your pages
preserve to those who will come of age
let it be known let it be shown
in vibrant colours whether or not solarised
let the image speak a million truths
that once gay-men broke out of their shells

But drums of war collide across the eastern skies

they say behind the golden dust is a bus of faggot hackers
before they clang their swords onto our flesh
I want to mend last wrap to console our adopted Gauta
it won’t be long till the approaching cloud
darkens our last breath of survival

As images inside a blk leather bag

the rest can be cleansed by hell fire
oh Monna Motapa nurturer of my soul
I wish you were here to witness this last book
of what remains of family portraits

The guilt of their fathers DNA filth their hearts

and silent terrors squeeze out their mothers quiet tears
their young boys did not bear them biological grandsons
or bring home an innocent makoti for approval of god’s eye

Before tonight acquires a brutal stillness

27
I will head up north to my Dongas
Badimo send with insight a lighting strike
through my hand deliver this gift with precision
before midnight each penetrative edge of fire
will charge the rock of every tree in sight
separate the cumulus from the heavenly love of skies
The township memory hangs online
once more for another divine hand wash

Monna Motapa alongside GayTown

will merge one special union of brotherhood

28
Double-Doo-Wop
I double-doo-wop
beneath a blanket of blues
seeking to wrap you
with these hungry palms
without shattering your light
like a gentle conductor
I freeze the lyric of time
melt in your double-doo-wop
endlessly
it smells like rain
dropping from scented corners
of my night skies
freeing the sparrows
outta my rib-cage.

29
Afrika
“Khabazela”
Mkhize
Your fingers are free
a wild wind blowing
whoo whoo
inside a purple winter

thunderstorms
pierces dust
hot rain
black forest

hungry flames
bite the plank
Marimba
threshing
a wooden floor

A star falls
dusk gathers
on your finger tips
whoo whoo
undressing moons
without moving.

30
31
Welcome
Moyo

32
Eternal Wonders
It is an unwritten religion to search for infinite wonders outside
of us
It is an unspoken practice to look for eternal marvels in the
pastures that lay afar
In fact very few have told of the rolling riches that quietly
reside within us
Very few nations have set to explore the realm that is held in
between melanin and bone

Appearances have seduced us into thinking that ecstasy is

curled up in the arms of others
Life hosts an army of masquerades that trick us into pursuing
splendour in foreign lands
Why have we forsaken the charm of self-made mystic and
ancient creations?
Why have we entrusted the magic to shallow waters?

Let the smoke of deceit settle onto lying wolves

Let it settle; and take on the war of tapping into the marvel that
is birthed by self
Let that flame lick and illuminate the roots of your soul
Dig up the salt of your being; for there lies true infinite wonders

33
Amlanjyoti
Goswami

34
Star Gazing
Babies are another universe,
Sovereigns of an unexplored galaxy.
A blink holds time still,
Like gods of another time,
Sitting on lotuses.

There, she goes!

Empress of the apartment!
On her daily round,
Room to room, she moves
Pramming and cooing,
Is everything all right?

Hard to tell, why

Smile turns into frown,
Did I do any wrong?
Hard to tell, why
The world moves round and round.

The universe of home,

Suddenly flaps
Its long open wings
Gliding into
Something called peace.

35
Soma Bose

36
The Aliens
Every evening, I gaze at sky,
With my amazing imagine, I look high,
Among the cloud, there may be a yacht-
It is hidden and sailing around with an amazing tact.
Inside it, there may be many looks like spider,
They may look like big bug or like any other creature.
With them, we have no communication,
Even, we cannot identify their proper location,
But still, we imagine, may be they are robot like machine!
May be, they are human-alike or of divine doctrine!

Aliens! What ever you may be!

We, humans, are not your enemy,
If you are in real existence,
If there is any clear path with original sense,
we will look for you without any avenge,
And this will be our ultimate message,
“How eternal, patient, we, the humans, are!
Stay away from your rigid belief, you please, appear!”

37
Mercy
Dhliwayo

38
Days like these
Pecola’s quest for the bluest eyes
Only left her out of her mind and with the kind of scars
That neither tissue oil nor cream could ever erase
So on days like these I pray; I pray that you may maintain
That glimmer and that wondrous smile
That you wear when you glare into the mirror
On these young days when all the mirror can do
Is produce a replica of you imitating your every move
The tapping of your tinny feet
Offbeat and disjointed from your child like giggles
Coz child; there will be days
When the mirror’s projection of your internal reflection
Marred by a culmination of exterior perceptions
Will either gratify you or scar you
With belligerent vanity or a sense of inferiority
I cannot shield you from this
But I can at least leave you words with which
I hope you could construct yourself a mirror
To use on those days when I am not there to remind you
That the standard of beauty cannot be measured against
Substance as paper-thin as images from magazines
Or distorted pictures from tv screens
That there is more to being than beauty that can only be
projected
on something as volatile as glass that easily shatters
Just as your existence is one of Gods infinite wonders
There are many hidden wonders that you are yet to unearth
So let blue eyes not be the subject of your quest
You just might lose your mind or go blind
And while there is sight blindness
I hope that you will find your sight without plucking out your
eyes
39
Nkateko
Masinga

40
Amagugu
The visitors are here.
They came to see Africa; to explore the motherland with their
eyes set on Serengeti sunsets,
barefoot treks across the sandy semi-arid savanna that is the
Kalahari desert. They came in knotted head wraps, beaded
neck-pieces and leopard print dresses.

They are here with their kiss the ground/I am on home soil/
back to my roots/diasporic homecoming/love for Africa.

The visitors are here.

They came to see you at your mother’s house.
Yesterday your eyes were set on an upset husband smelling of
Savanna cider before your barefoot trek to your mother’s house
wearing nothing but an anorak and a determination to leave
that man this time.
They will see your hospital-variety head wraps, post cervical
fracture neck-pieces and leopard print bruises from all the
beatings.

Nightly beatings,
your throat in a choke-hold, you choking on fumes from the
paraffin stove, the names of your almost children stuck in your
throat:
Misplaced, miscarried, missed by their mother.

Visitors, forgive us for our curse the land/infertile soil/dig up

our roots/love for Africa.

When we reclaimed our land, we did not know we were only

claiming space to dig our graves so we could call the women

41
to come peel vegetables and sing Amagugu while the men eat
meat and our coffins slowly sink into the ground along with our
dreams for a better Africa.

Where are our manners?

Kholo, go fetch the photo album and show them Tata’s pictures.
Roll out the Welcome mat. Thato, tip your hat in greeting. This
will be a very short meeting.
The dead hardly congregate with the living.

Amagugu alelizwe ayosal’ emathuneni (All precious treasure

remains in the grave).

42
43
Ulrike
Kussing

44
My Miracle of 2014
You

every curl
every curve

no straight lines

an explosion
of feelings

you unfurled
my sails -

a maiden voyage
to nowhere

to everywhere

45
Charl
Landsberg

46
Tender Heart
and you, my love, gone quickly by
a life so pure, and then to die
I miss you more than I can say
old tender heart of mine

so dead is dead, and you are gone

my heart grows cold as years grow long
but fondly I remember you
old tender heart of mine

the years are cruel and days are cold

and love is stripped as bones grow old
and you still shine inside of me
old tender heart of mine

what wonders you have worked in me

to keep me going endlessly
when I should die for lack of you
old tender heart of mine

a thought of you is all it takes

when heart and soul are poised to break
you brought me through the darkest years
old tender heart of mine

and even though you’re dead and gone

you love inside me lingers on
and I have hope for one more day
old tender heart of mine

47
 A Poem A Day
2015 Most Read

48
Rishan Singh
Motto of Life

When times are tough and

there’s nobody to help me,
i’d rather pick my things
and leave than beg through
the years to come.

Because of the years to come,

i don’t think I’ll make the year.

49
Xabiso Vili
“Strangers kiss softly as
moths”

A quote from Michael Ondaatje’s “In the skin of a lion”

You burnt me
With your singed,
Still-warm fluttering
Kisses,
Or was it I
Who burnt you?
I still can’t decide
Who was the flame
And who was it that
Flew too close
To a candlestick sun.
All that’s left now
Is the wax
From haphazard wings
Or from candlesticks
And the smell of sulphur
From matchstick kisses.

50
Sizakele Phohleli
the truth about love

They should have told you that as beautifully dressed in petals

love is, so is her wrath pleasantly drenched in thorns, guns and
knives,
that her peace matches her turmoil
that the making up equals the breaking down, the delirium, the
betrayal …
They should have warned you that love will ruin you, weave you
either into a poem or a curse.
that it will break you so hard that we will name our children
after our heartbreaks, after all the men who have ever left us,
be it our fathers or the lovers whose names will only ever be
known by these soiled sheets, lipstick stained wines glasses and
enamel ashtrays,
that these names are all our daughters will remember of our
lovers so much that they will never dare ask us of our first
loves, of our first heartbreaks, of the other woman, without the
need to break the mirror. They will remember our sufferings,
our mistakes every time they call out their own names.

They should have warned you that even long after they have left
you; long after they are gone you will still melt them into songs,
That you will learn to master the art of deforming lost lovers
into eternal ghosts
confine them in these poems, into these sonnets that are
clothed in nothing but their flesh, your tears and all that
mattered in the world, because something must attest to their
existence and memories will be all that is left of them, of you,
of her.
All these poems are the reflection of the clutter she has made
of you, of your wretched heart and all the wrong decisions you
51
have ever taken because you thought you could turn her into a
woman who stays… but you cannot teach an old dog new tricks,
mother should have told you this.
She should have told you that love will ruin you, past
recognition and return the next morning with a bag full of
apologies, justifications and how again you somehow are to
blame because clean apologies are nothing she aspires to,
She should have told you the truth, told you that love is not just
11 cows, long white dresses, cute little girls tossing white rose
petals along the aisle, blood stains on crispy white sheets on the
first night, that love is not just the tossing of bouquets in the
air.
She should have warned you that at times love will destroy you;
that she will mesh you either into a poem or into a swearword,
sometimes both.

52
Tulile Siguca
Afrika is Scarred

Home is said to be where the heart is

A place only becomes home if love lives
An untainted love once called our hearts a home
It has to us now become foreign
My brother is no longer my own
Reason? Far from mine is his home
Though My land is the same he too calls home
From the same sky fall nourishing rains only blood stains drip
drop on our soil
All from the veins of brothers who left their own
Packed in suitcases of hope and faith in humanity
“Come, we’ll be safe in South Africa they have ubuntu”
If only they had a clue
“Come, from the storm of guerilla bullets that terrorise our
skies we’ll be free in South Africa shelter we’ll find”
If only they knew
“Come, a rainbow of a nation is South Africa for us to the sun
shall rise”
If only they knew that in the land of reconciliation
live Afrikans who kill Afrikans for being in Afrika
By our brothers and sisters our brothers and sisters are being
massacred
The soul of Afrika is scarred
For the Afrikan child the mind is not a tool used but a weapon
misused, fooled by systems too cruel
Vultures with pockets that drool at the sight mama Afrika’s
jewels
There are demons in our midst who find bliss in all of this
They Hide behind the white lies told by puppet democracy’s to
blind our minds
53
The blind our minds
But Bear in mind our hearts are a home for love
Love!
always, love

54
Nqaba Dano
A Painful Truth

I have witnessed them speak,

Their voices echoing in the stillness of silence,
I’ve seen their words painted on screens
And papers no one shall truly read,
They speak with vigor and passion
Which transcend from their hearts to the hearts of many,
They have become idols
Who use their words to inspire and create a following?
I have heard them speak
Use words like paint brushes to create vivid pictures
With words that manipulate the mind,
They have imprisoned the consciousness of man
And he remains bound
To senseless propaganda that is never silenced,
We do not know truth from lies,
We too busy believing the empty promises
From individuals that do not hear their lies,
But in a world where everyone speaks and does not listen
Where is the compassion in hearing someone’s pain?
Where is the mercy in hearing someone’s plea for help?
Are we this ignorant that we idly stand by?
And shield our eyes from the painful displays
That promise to plague us,
Are we too cowardly that we express action?
Through words that are meaningless,
The pen is mightier than the sword this has been written,
But what happens when the words we create
Using that pen cut deeper than the sword,
For words uttered by ignorance can incite misery and pain,
Are we too far gone that we do not hear the voices of those in
55
need,
Too far gone to hear those who plead?
I heard them speak,
Saw their words come alive in the presence of silence,
In the world we live silence speaks volumes
For the words uttered have lost their weight

56
Welcome Moyo
Familiar Stranger

We sat across the table from each other; yet it felt like we were
continents apart. The silence killed the air in the room. But,
we sat, in the silence, hoping to eavesdrop into each other’s
internal conversations.

I didn’t get to hear his demons talk though, but mine, my

demons, oh they were as loud as multiple inner city gunshots.

They kept asking me, “How can someone who was as close to
you as ink is on tattooed skin be so cold to the touch? Hm?
How did that happen?” I couldn’t answer them. I could only
describe what we had become.

“I don’t know, but I feel like we’re familiar strangers now. You
know, the type of stranger that you see every day at the gym,
at the corner store or on your way to work. You know him,
you recognise him, but he is ultimately a stranger. A familiar
stranger,” I said.

I knew they wouldn’t be satisfied with my answer, so before they

could push for more, I walked out of the conversation and back
into the room where my love and I wordlessly sat.

Since I couldn’t figure out how we grew apart, I looked to

him for the answer. But when I saw his face project his own
struggles with the question, that’s when I knew he also only
could describe us as strangers, familiar strangers.

57
Tshiamo Modise
Ailments

For singing off tune in my veins

Erupting volcanoes on my joints
Dancing on my sensitive spots
Easing my loneliness with pains
I thank and love you still
For reminding me I’m not made of steel

58
Philani Nombika
for all that is worth it

So roses are red and violets are blue.

Orange sunsets make you feel like you have seen eternity.
My feet and heart seem to whisper symphonies to each other.
My earphones have figured how the world sounds.
My mother’s knees know wordless prayers.
I bet with my heartbeats.
I know that trees give the best hugs.
Movie stars have out-of-this-world bodies.
I know that my eyes have seen the world.
Woman are the closest we can get to God.
I have seen that love isn’t always a two-way street and giving is
not about receiving.
Not every smile is happy.
I love you’s mean more in possession than being in love.
Not knowing much makes sense.
I think God is a big man who spies on you.
Holding a woman is much more than any weapon

59
Zaheera Badat
Sleep When You’re Dead
Sleep writhes out of my tangled bed
A sanctuary of awkward twisting and turning
Where deep sleep and calm
Dominates the 300 thread count sheets
On every other day

Unholy thoughts and torturous haunting

Waft in from the open window
Glaring at the putrid night
Does nothing to quell my fears
The sky an inkpool
Of
Unwritten threats
Unbroken spells
Unfinished business
Daylight I beckon in rasping roaring whispers
Urgently
Salve on this festering cauldron of morbidity
Jasmine, lavender and what is that rankness
That dare plunder the nocturnal floral tribute with vile offering
The cadavers that insist on being
A rotting reminder
A decaying disturbance
A putrefying parody
To life’s sweet song
Go where you like
Do what you must
It is an unmarked day
For your return to dust

60
Charl Landsberg
Fees Must Fall

this Blade
just won’t cut it
dulled down
by his personal contempt
for his very job
and his wards
it’s dangerous to attempt
to use an unkempt
blunt knife
that has nothing but resentment
for the kitchen of his office
and the chef of the government
who no longer cooks for the students
but hide
behind their gilded vault
what use is there
for a chef and a Blade
when they’ve sacrificed service for assault?
this Blade
just won’t cut it

61
Frank Meintjies
Krotoa, Walking Between
Worlds

you walk, between

the worlds
we follow those steps
the seashores, robben island, the open plains
the interstices between death & vitality

the narrow path between my song & dance

you, a linguist of note
speak to us!
interpret, read the signs
make a song from the symbols
that dot these walls
for we are so often lost, adrift
bobbing uneasily
between the veils of translation
she works the words
from the belly upwards
through tongue & breath & spaces of the skull
word by word
she weights up
the men who stand before her
the words work & rework her
she invests them with breath
from worlds within
she rolls them on her tongue
she births them
in cool dank air
or sunshine
evoker
62
diplomat, broker, interloper
the vine joining ground & air
who will translate for us
the sea’s utterances
the wind’s murmurs
the look of the kori bustard
the small fire’s whoosh & crackle
from the entrails of wet sticks
the line of the pass
that bends through my mountain thoughts
& pieces of land
that stand solid
as we migrate from outposts & peripheries
to teeming centres
via farmers’ markets & trading posts
weaver of strands
hold us, your children
in your imagination
send us braided messages
send love & affection & chants
& sighs of longing
those feet walked
the hard life
doubted here (at the kraal), mistrusted there (at the fort)
inspected, suspected
suspended in other’s dreams
you dreamt of wanderings & walkabouts
as you donned the garb, buttoned up
stood in thin shade
cast by
the houses of colonialism
van riebeeck’s orders
van meerhof’s manners
wagenaer’s scolding glare
as you swigged wine & laughed out loud
63
at his dinner table
the tight fitting name: ‘eva’
the clamps & constraints
that flowed
from their pens
as they counted you & logged you
in diaries & registers
in your death
you – & we with you – escape this
we walk among shrubs, grow into trees, embrace wind
we flow with the pain
we walk the shoreline
the single mother
the abandoned partner
the searcher for meaning, in multiples abuses
searching for some truth
of a life in the margins
the lichen that stays
on rock
even as the tide retreats
you stand with us
renditioned, trafficked, exiled
simply ignored
or made to labour for bread & tots
when we are made to trade
cattle for goods
you walk alongside
the uncertain returnee
the desperate ones who come through beit bridge
those stolen from africa
the children plucked & taken thousands of miles
me, extrapolated & replanted in strange settings
in your death
an astuteness, in your silence
a voice
64
through your death
mishak can be swathed
in the eye
of the moment
jemma can wander the sky
cole can lope through landscapes
that existed in the time before time
when we toil away, or measure hours, offer silent service
under the lash of the sun
when we
bear the unbearable
when we are overwhelmed
and fizzle out, succumbing
to nervous conditions
when depression
crawls over skin
like a shadow
may we think of you
may we think of the mopani tree, the boegoe plant
the needles of the rooibos
the aloe & its healing bitterness
the acacia’s thorn
used for stitching
& you … a sturdy bough

65
Tshepo Mabasa
Love

Blowing like a storm

this love started like a song
a sweet melody feeding souls with joy
a beautiful queen stood breaking all
flaws
short light hair / with dark straps
along the end
her eyes blue and wide
like an ocean floating with stars
her skin was soft and delicate
like a gorgeous caramel linen covering
her flesh
he was lost in a love spell
A man of virtue
prominence / ethics and respect
were some of his life aspects
heart pounding like a drag race
blood smoldering his body like a
summer rain
he just can’t wait
as he gets close / nervously close to a
heart attack
capturing a glimpse of her smile
blew him away
closing his eyes in the middle of the
road
to replay that zoomed image of her
whitened teeth
stretching her lips
to Brighten his heart
66
cars hooting
he remind stagnant
creating a oozing flow of her portrait
A sudden wind washed his brain
away
his mind has being betrayed
by a loving heart that led him astray
i warm heat hand touched him
sending child down his spine
like a needle stabbing his back
endlessly
her hand pulling him out of harms way
[a woman gets you out of trouble
which she got you in the first place]
Up close, to her
he is breathless
knees weak and shaking
through electrifying attraction
igniting his soul
her name escape her lips
feeling them clap with a prose sound
saliva forming in high capacity in his
mouth
he blabs out his name quick
making sure his lips are immediately
sealed
her image, intensified in his mind
soon they become good friends
while he knows he wants more
a solid shoulder to cry on developed
sharing her problems
the more love broadened
failing their lives with joy
like a fairytale
forever inlove
67
Life draws a line
pulsating sacrifices to save their love
hearts drawn out as they live far apart
always thinking out and about
excruciating pictures formulating in
his cerebral
picturing the beauteous queen with
another man
breaking walls
punching floors
his heart hard as steel
he can’t even feel
her presence on a short basis aren’t
enough
he stands closed up and squeezed
incarcerated by his own mind
showing unfaithfulness
her long chats with guys
hot flirts she thinks
he wont mind
inside his heart is like rotten cow dung
She tries had to explain
but he still insists she should take the
blame
loving her so much he lets her leave
this way
endless arguments escalate
he just has to stay
but also can’t live this way
he loves her so much
trying to show her while this love torch
is still on
like a placing a break in his heart
he stands in the dark
waiting to stop her every breath from
68
escaping her lungs
grabbing her throat
he used to kiss like an ice cream Cone
a child licks with all hoist might
her breath stops
eyes widen
tears boil out of the ocean burning in
her eyes
stars darken as she loses
consciousness
placing a gun on his temple
falling down on his knees
and collapsing in her arms
where he used to rest every night
in the past
brains splattered out
he died for love
but she regained consciousness and
moved on

69
 Poetry Seen

21 Poems
Dear South Africa,

You are not a child anymore.

We should have thrown you a huge street bash and

handed you your key to adulthood. But we couldn’t.
There’s not enough to celebrate. You see, we’re not sure
that you deserve the key or a party. So… here we are.

We’re trawling through poems written in the past 21

years, looking for a change. A milestone. Something
that we might not have noticed before. Something that
assures us that you have grown. That you have grown up
and grown away from your apartheid past. We’re looking
for your adult face, the face that has wizened a little.
That has learnt from burnt tyres to burnt humans how
not to be die swart gevaar anymore.

70
President Zuma said that we had a good story to tell but
we’re not so sure that we do. From Boipatong to recalled
presidents Marikana to red overalls in parly, we’re still
demanding justice. Between pit latrines and undelivered
school books we’re left wondering… are we too harsh?

The rainbow has dulled. Madiba is no more. You can’t

hide behind the rainbow anymore. Kuyanuka there. We
have seen what you could do to Tatane and multiplied
that with our miners. So we know that we don’t have the
pot of gold anymore. Hade.

You have survived your teens, we should applaud that.

We do. There are many things that you have done well.
You are respected all over the world. This is why we want
more from you.

We had high expectations and you have let us down. We

still demand more from you because you are us. And we
are you. We can’t regress to the state of emergency, the
colour bar or bantustanism of the past. We must judge
hard and fight even harder for ourselves to win.

You haven’t given up on yourself. We haven’t either. That

is why we continue to write these poems to question you,
challenge you, make you hear us, celebrate and love you
hard.

These 21 Poems are (y)ours.

with love,

twenty one poets.

about 21 Poems: this project features poems written and

published variously in the last 21 years about and for
South Africa by South African poets. The participating
poets are: Xabiso Vili, Rantoloko Molokoane, Prince

71
Shapiro, David Maahlamela, Simiso Sokhela, Napo
Masheane, Fasaha Mshairi, Masingita Masiya,
Mthunzikazi Mbungwana, Poet Flow, Kabelo Mofokeng,
Motho Fela, Icebound, Siza Nkosi, Unathi Slasha, Mandi
Poefficient, Makhosazana Xaba, Goodenough Mashego,
zamantungwa...

All artwork is by fine artist, Wesley Pepper.

The aim of the project is to track, using poetry, the story

of South Africa. Some of the questions that prompted
this project include, has South Africa changed? Are the
poets writing about the same things over the years or do
we have different (or no) problems? Is a poem written
ten years ago still relevant today? Do we have enough
to celebrate to outshine our problems as a country?
What do the poets have to say in this twenty first year of
Democracy?

As to whether or not these questions are answered, we

leave that up to the reader. We express our feelings best
in verse and these poems are every emotion charged
with revolutionary love. our hopes, as Poetry Potion, is
that these poems will ignite a conversation as well as
inspire a passionate love for justice and peace.

Find all poems on poetrypotion.com/21-poets.html

72
twenty one weelk | twenty one poets | twenty one years of democracy in South Africa
 Contributors
K ylin Lotter is a twenty year old student currently
study at Wits University. She is majoring in Design
and Drawing as well as Writing.

A li Znaidi (b.1977) lives in Redeyef, Tunisia. He

is the author of several chapbooks, including
Experimental Ruminations (Fowlpox Press, 2012),
Moon’s Cloth Embroidered with Poems (Origami Poems
Project, 2012), Bye, Donna Summer! (Fowlpox Press,
2014), and Taste of the Edge (Kind of a Hurricane Press,
2014). For more details you can visit his blog at  aliznaidi.
blogspot.com.

G ameedah Riffel is a young poet that lives in Cape

Town, South Africa and is in her last year of
schooling at Pinelands High School.

T lhookomelo TS Mashile, grew up in a family of 6 in

a township based in Mpumalanga called Leroro.
He started writing at age 11. He is now a full-time poetry
performer/writer, and he is Studying Law with UNISA.

M ighty the Poet is Knowledge Mbatha, a boy of 17

years of age, lives in mamelodi Pretoria. He is in
high school at mamelodi secondary school and he is doing
Matric. He loves playing basketball and reading novels, he
is shy and likes making noise, he is very playful but when
he sets his mind on something he does it without wasting
time, he does not like a huge crowd, he prefers to be with
his family, few friends, and his girlfriend, he loves food
and, lastly he believes that his soul purpose is to see his
girlfriend happy.

T ulile Siguca is Mthatha born, Grahamstown raised

and a Durban-based foreign to self writer.

K abelo Mofokeng, from Soweto writes his journey

embracing multi-lingual speech patterns and

74
urban sounds as he experiences them. Some poems are
quiet while others draw on his affinity with jazz, and
here he integrates the different kinds of sounds and
associations of the with jazz music. His self-published
collection of poems and visuals (2008) Blakpen,
composed of poems finding their roots within oral
traditions. He is currently doing MA, Creative Writing at
Rhodes University. He is part of SOWETOPHOTOALBUM,
a collective of five photographers from Pimville. His
photographs have formed part of numerous Exhibitions.

W elcome Moyo is a writer and singer who loves

using metaphors in his pieces. Find out more
here: www.welx.wordpress.com

A mlanjyoti Goswami’s poems have appeared in

publications in India, UK and USA, including The
Caravan, Mint, IQ: The Indian Quarterly, Indian Literature
(Sahitya Akademi), The North East Review, The Poetry
Shed, DailyO and the Silver Birch Press. He grew up in
Guwahati, Assam and lives in Delhi.

S oma Bose is an amateur writer who has had some

poems published by forward poetry social and high
on poem.

M ercy Dhliwayo (Concrete Ground) is a poet, rapper

and a writer based in Polokwane. Her works have
been published in East Jasmine Review, The Bundle of
Joy and Other Stories from Africa: Africa Book Club
Anthology- Vol 1, Poetry Potion’s 1st Quarterly Print on
Being Human, Poetry Potion’s 5th Quarterly Print: Love
Potion, PCM African Eyeball e-anthology, and Have we
put out the fire Journal (2011). Her poetry has also been
translated into Swedish and published in the Swedish
literary magazine, Karavan.

N kateko Masinga is a medical student and poet who

loves writing as much as she enjoys studying the
intricacies of the human body.

U lrike Kussing is a lecturer in logistics management

by day and dreams of poetry by night. She is moved

75
by life, people and words. Recently most of her poems
have been birthed behind the steering wheel; scribbled
down on any scrap of paper that is within reach.

C harl Landsberg is a South African poet, musician,

and artist. Landsberg’s work focusses on varying
topics ranging from feminism, LGBTQIA work, and
social justice, to fantasy, fiction, and various kinds of
experimentation.

R ishan SINGH is a South African poet, a biologist,

a writer and a qualified English Language
Instructor. He hold qualifications from the University of
KwaZulu-Natal and Cambridge University in the United
Kingdom. His poetry has appeared in numerous national,
regional, international and broadway journals, books
and magazines. He has also written short stories and
fiction. His poem ‘Definition of Life’ was presented at the
15th Poetry Africa community writing forum, an event
at which Mphutlane Wa Bofelo, one of the speakers and
commentators, was present. He presented the poem by
himself to applause.

T onight, Xabiso is Bruce Banner. Always angry. This

is how he has learnt to control the Hulk. Perhaps
anger is a metaphor for love. He is remembering times
she hollered her loneliness into the wind and nothing
howled back. These are the midnights he dreads.

S izakele Mphohleli I am 27 years old and poetry is

one thing I seem to have mastered. I have a poetry
page of Facebook which I single-handedly manage. All
the poems on the page are my own original work unless
stated otherwise. I have to date 17 500 followers and it is
growing daily. “GayKindaLove” is the name of the page.

T ulile Siguca is Mthatha born, Grahamstown bred.

Durban crumbling

N qaba Dano has been writing poetry for about 8

years this year. has a blog that has been going
for 3 years and is growing in views day by day. the writer
enjoys writing poetry and finds it as a great medium to

76
express his thoughts and feelings.

W elcome Moyo explores the topic of lovers drifting

apart. He is a 27 year old writer and singer who
works as a content creator at a creative agency.

T shiamo Dice Modise is a being that practices the

art of dissolving problems in ink and leaving the
solution on paper.

p hilani is a nowadays poets whos a full time poet and

part time human but everyday awesomist

Z aheera Badat is a budding poet who’s passionate

about language. She have written a few poems
which she posts on her Facebook page called Spilt Ink by
Zaheera Badat

F rank Meintjies lives and works in Johannesburg.

He has published poems in anthologies and
frequently participates in public readings.

T shepo Mabasa is a poet, lyricist, and freelance

writer.i have been writing since 2008,i discovered
an eye for the pen through music, the art urged me to
create my own music, and music evolved from poetry,
it was inevitable not to fall in love with poetry.i am
currently working as a freelance writer for a community
youth magazine. I am planning to study arts in creative
writing to further develop my skills. And I am a member
(WRC) winterveldt writers group which contributes to
youth development. I am working on a book which has
never been done, the concept and style will bring a whole
new perspective on writing. Tshepo Mabasa lives in the
rural parts of Winterveldt , South of pretoria and aims to
highlight it on the map.

77
 Submissions
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always.

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