Jabulani Mzinyathi Poems

when you sing the sweet melodies
mine will be the discordant voice
hold you by the scruff of the neck
repeatedly shaking the conscience
...

there is a poet
embedded in every prophet

taste the caustic poetry
...

the village torn apart
incessant quarrels everywhere
the village head drunk
his wife picking quarrels
...

bits of betting cards
strewn on the floor
like confetti
bits of fractured dreams
...

in the trenches together yesterday
burying comrades in shallow graves
burying kith and kin in shallow graves
the tree of freedom by blood watered
...

thought we were in it together
thought we were our own liberators
thought you were driven by altruism
did not know of latent mercenary tendencies
...

hear the beautiful tapestry
woven from the consciousness
see the images of freedom
that undulating beat
...

bereft of dreams
dreams bashed by truncheons
dreams under the jackboots
jack boots of the philistines
...

in the slime and grime
in the grinding poverty
in the havens of deprivation
in the heart of desperation
...

a dry barren wind of graft
blowing across this continent

nations in turbulence
...