The Mountain Pass Poem by Gert Strydom

There are bullets that draw sparking lines
on the rocks next to him
and in the mountain pass,
Jan Pieterse and ten men
stand to keep
the English back.

The smoke of shots being fired
hangs like fog around him
and gunlock after gunlock,
are cocked time after time
and Jan Pieterse and his men
shoot carefully while the morning’s dusk appears.

At the bottom a Boer commando
goes through the river’s ford
and there are horse hoofs resounding
and a liddite bomb,
explodes like a flaming star
in the grey air
before the sun rises.

The dust clears
and the commando rides away
and it’s just Jan Pieterse and one comrade,
that is still alive
and they give their horses full reigns.

It’s only Jan Pieterse that gets away
and he turns his horse around,
chase back into the bullets
and liddite bombs
to get his mate.

With his wounded comrade
hanging over the front of his saddle
Jan Pieterse and each Englishmen
experience the first red rays of the sun
and his horse walks slowly on,
as if no bullet can touch him there
and nothing can kill a Boer hero.

The English stop shooting
and cheer about the bravery
of a enemy Boer,
that disappears with rifle in his hand
over the horizon.

[References: The historic heroic story of Jan Pieterse during the second Anglo-Boer war. The poem “Rit-rympie” by Toon van den Heever.]