Morning-Worship Poem by Gert Strydom

(after Hein Viljoen)

Out of the Bible psalm 91 is read,
we pray and eat milk-tart without fear.
Like a wheelbarrow that squeaks
the guinea-fowl calls: bankrupt and again bankrupt.
Mother says that the Father does care for them too.
we enjoy the plaited deep-fried doughnuts soaked in syrup;
like a fleeing demon a hadeda-ibis screeches.
[Reference: "Plaasbiduur" (farm worship service) by Hein Viljoen.
Poet's note: just across the street at Colliery Road there is a wild reserve with a lot of guinea-fowl in it. The hadeda-ibises come to peck both snails and earthworms in the yard, they screech when they fly-up or fly over and glimmer with a copper-bronze sheen in the sun.]
© Gert Strydom