Black & Untitled Poem by Ofentse Hajane (The Dark So'tho Seer)

Unto the midst of hell.
I remained chained to my warrant of freedom,
My body knows only the sting
That sleeps in the hands of my tormentor.
With thorned whips, they tear through his ebony skin.
Grey hair upon his head,
Yet he flinches not.
But pain? He knows it well.
He endures it like the weight of history itself.
Still—he will not be renamed.
Out loud he cries,
'Sipho...'
'Sipho...'
His name, beautiful and full of home.
But to them, he is only 'Sifo'
A plague.
A curse.
A disease.

Once again, he remains,
Black and Untitled.
They tried to clothe him in the tattered robes
Of a culture they mangled,
Twisted his name to fit the teeth of conquerors.
And with every strike of the whip,
I too stood firm.
They said:
'There is light at the end...'
But I have known only darkness.
The kind that lives in the marrow.
The kind that swallows memory.
I was cast into that endless night,
A battle I never asked for,
But one I could not escape.
Then I heard it again.
His voice -only his,
'Black & Untitled.'

It woke in me, a light of life,
It lingered unto my head.
Even as my body bled and broke,
I suppose they thought of me dead.
Still I rose
Limping toward a road unknown.
In those moments,
My people,
Even in silence,
Glowed with the warmth of unity.
Home became any place
Where they stood beside me.
Time passed.
Tears dried.
Grief turned to fury.
And in my blackened heart,
I heard it again:
'Black & Untitled.'

It echoed.
It burned.
'A nation shall hold together! '
The words of an old warrior
In the belly of war.
And with those words,
My body became fire.
My breath—vengeance.
They once stood idle,
Armed with nothing but survival.
But I...
I refused.
For I will forever remain,
Black & Untitled.

And when they forget,
Forget what chained our souls
And wrapped our bodies in silence.
I will be there.
Not to curse,
But to remind.
You bound yourselves with your own curse.
But you will not escape memory.
You will not outrun truth.
For I am

Black & Untitled.


By O.M Hajane (The Dark So'tho Seer)