Johannesburg In 2013 Poem by Gert Strydom

In every face that I behold,
I see a certain chill, a certain cold
and in the distance white mine heaps glimmer
light flash over tall buildings, glass windows shimmer
and it is not the Johannesburg of old

and everybody fits in,
the gum sniffing beggar children
with faces becoming obscure
and waggling limbs now miss-formed without a cure

the street whores, displaying their wares
smiling as without a care, with a cheap kind of glamour
calling out obscenities

along with workers from manufacturing industries
walking in rubber boots
in blue overalls

and even the people in ties and suits
who are in cahoots
with the moneymen

fit perfectly in to a heartless city without a soul
where the value of money is the criterion
that turns men and women into carrion,
in a place that imprisons, like a huge enormous gaol.