Thabani Khumalo Poems

Your face was lurid, your true beauty was the fairest of all to behold.
I should have let you run with me to the finish line -
running abreast to savor the covert admiration of the boys and the girls in the view,
you were strong and looked slick like a racing stallion,
...

When the waging hope had fallen -
when I, Thabani, fell out grace -
when it was time to make a physical transition -when a poor spirit had to meddle with the functions of the soul -
when I was taunted into weeping and unhappiness,
...

When the waging hope had fallen -
when I, Thabani, fell out grace -
when it was time to make a physical transition -
when a poor spirit had to meddle with the functions of the soul -
...

When are you going to leave that land of crumbling carcasses?
I pray that you may tuck your lower lip under your teeth
and forcefully drive yourself against the might of the wrought up rabble,
wring off the sweat to reach the clearest corner
...

A handsome man steadily paces down
the pavement with his hands scooped up at the chest,
he keeps swinging the other hand to his mouth
as he seems to chew something of aliment nuts in his mouth -
...

Who do you say I am?
For I knew who I was even before
I was siphoned down into physical life by force.
I stood between the firmament of heaven and the plain of the earth,
...

My mother told me words
that drew me closer to the object of physical maturity,
she told me that I was a breech-born
wizard of the dark side, at the extreme left -
...

May God guide my head
from reading up a harmful science -
may God guide my raging heart
from rocking with the tidal whims of my utter dismay -
...

In this atmospheric sea of acid,
acid in the air and acid in the body
sustain living tissue in an upright posture.
...

During my absence,
I was out in the wilderness,
I was biding to be the king that none of our former kings ever were,
I learned the cold ugly truth that made every lie too hot to handle.
...