Marikana Poem by Thabo Seseane

Distant homes,
Distant wives,
Distant children…
Gold-bearing migrant beavers,
Pleasing when in their warrens,
But not when they must eat,
Or plead a boardroom seat.

Distant homes
And fractured families:
Only whole in a blink-
Less than a month of weeks-
That heady time of warmth,
When year-end festive cheer
Mends, bonds, and postpones fear.

Beavers relaying wealth,
Building dams, towns and cities-
Even a silhouette
Wraith of Azania,
Now still a compass point-
Rock-falls off the earth's roof,
Rumbling quakes and tremors-
All familiar terrors.

Far and wide,
Loud beavers, crowded in
The parched plain, dust-covered
But not in gold dust or
Other precious metal.
Chanting and chattering,
Bearing war- implements
Within a ring of steel.


Bad beavers.
Cannon-fodder beavers.


Marikana Country:
Two-coloured beaver towns.
Fine rugs with tattered edges,
Attractive for show but strewn with
The desiccated shells of dreams;
From the cape's table-top
To the north of Mapungubwe.

Distant wives
Long for distant husbands…
Distant homes … thin children
With bellies bloated, still, scared,
Staring at the traitor's face,
That now shows dread and greed without a mask:
As our today and future welcome the past.