Here Is A Getrude Sneeze Number One Poem by Sarah Mkhonza

My Aunt Getrude as we have decided to call ber
Greeted my brother's friend and asked him if he
Was with his 'mother.' The air around us became
So embarrassed that one could feel it come out
And envelope us in shame, as we hid our eyes.

The guy answered shyly and told her that the
Woman she was with was his wife. For the first
Time my aunt beat her chest and shouted at herself
'Getrude Miles! ' her hands landing hard above
Her breasts.

It was the first time for us to see her repentant
On a mistake she makes if we may call her faux pas
Mistakes for that is failure to use words. Hers we
Will call sneezes for they are as frequent as when
Someone has a cold.

My aunt wiggled her thin waist and walked away
Her head high with pride as she told all of us
That she does not have to be shunned for this
Deed for it is not as if she has not killed
All the children of Isaac, my grandfather.

It has become hard to understand how one as loud
And outspoken about life as my aunt is, could have
Actually been born in the same family as my uncles
For all eleven of them let her get away with it.

She pokes her nose into everybody's business
As if it hers. She is the red nose of a clown and
Needs to be seen everywhere by everyone for
She sees the world as her stage on which to
Perform her little acts of speak-before-you
Are-spoken-to.

I have come to wonder when my uncles will take her
To task for she disappears into her hut and comes
Out when she has something to say, while they simmer
in her stew waiting for I do not know what. It is then
That she appears like a dark cloud and walks
On the plains of our homestead in the direction
Of her next prey.

My mother knows when it is her turn and she decides
To wear a thick skin for 'the big performer has come
To run my house, ' she says as she winks at us and
Offers her tea. My Aunt's usual preamble of 'As you
May already know, ' she says as she sips the tea
Looking above the brim of the cup at my mother.
'Sam has done it again.'

My mother will always look first at me then at her
And say in her usual, 'What has he done this time? '
My aunt will continue and tell her how this last
Born of Isaac is doing this thing that shames the
Clan and clap her hands in surprise for she knows
'He does not know what that will do to his people.'

My Aunt believes everybody should live life according
To the rules she makes and says were made by William,
My grandfother and swears that all the males who are not
Circumcised should do so for it is as it should be in
The big book or they will get the diseases of the land.

Today she ended by telling my mother to remember that
It is time to deal with my grandfather's will for it
has been three months since he was laid to rest. She
Made it clear she knows who is the one to tell all
The clan what goes to whom and then disappeared and
Went to Uncle Piet's house.

My mother told us that this is going to be quite an
Act and said our Aunt has to know once and for all
That she does not wear the pants in our house. I
Laughed for I have heard her say this time and again
Only to find the pants hanging lose around my Aunt
Getrude's thin frame once again.