An Inciting Concert (Or So Was Thought At The Time) Poem by Gert Strydom

I drive my yellow Bmw
with six cylinders roaring powerful
beneath a group of students
five pressed into the back
and three of us in the front

to listen to Koos Kombuis,
Johannes Kerkorrel, Bernoldus Niemand
and the Gereformeerde Blues Band
at the voëlvry tour.

The Afrikaans rock and roll concert
is banned at Stellenbosch
by the university
(probably by order of the government) ,

but another venue is found
where thousands of students turn up
at the Drie Gewels hotel
and it goes really jolly

and policemen with cameras
come to look
at who looks like communists
and whom they later
can crack down on.

Songs are sung
about government ministers
so and so
and we were told
who and what they really are

and we know
Johnny isn’t dead,
he’s just passed out
from all the drugs

and maybe in heaven
but probably
already in hell

and the maid Sara
makes green tea
for the man with the Bmw
that every now and then
embraces her
like a mother

and every thing goes well,
but for the policemen
who act like a group of clowns
trying to play spy

while criminals run loose
at other places
murdering, robbing
and stealing cars
and dealing out drugs to kids.