A LONG JOURNEY Poem by Musaemura Zimunya

Through decades that ran like rivers
endless rivers of endless woes
through pick and shovel sjambok and jail
O such a long long journey

When the motor-car came
the sledge and the ox-cart began to die
but for a while the bicycle made in Britain
was the dream of every village boy

With the arrival of the bus
the city was brought into the village
and we began to yearn for the place behind the horizons

Such a long travail it was
a long journey from bush to concrete

And now I am haunted by the cave dwelling
hidden behind eighteen ninety
threatening my new-found luxury
in this the capital city of my mother country
I fight in nightmarish vain
but my road runs and turns into dusty gravel
into over-beaten foot tracks that lead
to a plastic hut and soon to a mud-grass dwelling
threatened by wind and rain and cold

We have fled from witches and wizards
on a long long road to the city
but behind the halo of tower lights
I hear the cry from human blood
and wicked bones rattling around me

We moved into the lights
but from the dark periphery behind
an almighty hand reaches for our shirts.