A World I Know Poem by Nkululeko Mdudu

Greetings Sir;
Oh greetings Red-eye.

What an honour for a madman to meet a star.
Well Sir, become too bright and madness surely isn’t far.

Still, what brings you here on this drowsy night?
You might say I’ve come to bring you some light.

Now; now, stop with your riddles and tell me straight.
For that kind of truth sir you will have to wait.

Then what message do you bring?
I bring no such thing.

No message; huh, explain!
I am no one’s messenger.

Then what, have you come to make fun?
Please Sir… I have enough fun just seeing you run.

Then what Red-eye, tell me!
Alright then, listen carefully:

Son of Ireshire!
Gilbert of the red waters and white fire;
Borne on the flaming horns with silver stripes are you.
Black hooves tread the golden fields of your heart,
Great birds and giant trees for you were made,
Now you dare call it Madness? ? ! !

Let this Red-eye of heaven gaze harshly at you,
So you might remember:

Remember the days you played as a Kid;
Voices played inside your head.
Remember when your dreams deprived you of sleep;
As you called out in the dark,
And you heard echoes of your father’s voice.

Remember when you were married in the mind
To a faceless bride,
Or when your father’s throne was falling into a volcanic fire?
You rose to resurrect what is now Ireshire:

The land of gifts and time,
For those who give it time to be.

You believed in it once, Gilbert Sire,
So believe in it now as we grow cold, us stars.
A desert, not unlike Mars,
Is what remains of our minds.

Fix us, make us better!
Let not our eternal light become a special effect
Like those on a movie set.

We have seen it all; as in the night we rise,
And in the day; the sun is our disguise.

Please Sir, I am not asking you to leave this planet,
Just sail the cosmic sea winds like the gannet:
Who sleeps in the sky;
But would never this world deny,
And who never returns without a meal.

Sir, remember your deal:
“If my lord would bless me in all the ways he can,
Then I would do my best to be his right-hand man.”

[When you stopped believing,
All the parental forces stopped conceiving:
The winds stopped blowing;
The currents stopped flowing;
The fires stopped burning,
The planet stopped turning.
Even those still crawling,
Could see that the sky was falling]

Do not think; for one second, that this is a message,
I told you, I am no one’s messenger.

Now do what ever you have to do,
So you may ably do what you want to.

You did not create Ireshire,
Nor did it create you.
It is the king of the cosmic clan,
It is the master plan…et.
One’s own world, an outside reality,
And eventually, the only world they see.