Gert Strydom (03 April 1964 / Johannesburg, South Africa)

Eventually the mine closed,
where people worked for months
without a salary, the last of them leave the grounds,
and there’s a strong suspicion

that the new black owners took the profit into their own pockets,
refining the gold somewhere else outside of the company,
causing the company deliberately to break apart
and it is as if nobody can stop or want to stop this felony.

With stubble on their faces men stand in the streets
guarding cars in the hot sun
and they talk Afrikaans, it’s as if the blood clots in their veins
while life and all income stops for them,

where some even live in boxes on the street,
trying to find shelter in the open space behind a church.

[Reference: Sonnet – Uit Malvern (Sonnet – From Malvern) by S. J. Pretorius.]