Passage Poem by Thabo Seseane

We were sustained and showed semi- radiance
From being washed by waves of past and future guilt.
Tethers of penance held our breath
Adding days and years
To the lungs and beating hearts
Of small parts in our extremities which
Dying bit by bit,
Creep unheeding and relentless
Towards the centre.

We often searched with darting eyes glazed by
The wasteland of togetherness:
Searching for something not there.
Blocking each other's view as, with desperation,
We thirstily drank the light filtering around
Our silhouettes; desperate
For the sprays from life's quenching fountains.

Like a carpet of intricate design,
Bound by ceremonial knots,
Togetherness decreed,
Washed but never cleansed, never renewed
By childish laughter or peevish complaints,
Patina'd knots with loosening bonds...
Strands unravelling
Here and there and at all corners:
Our two knots-
Our unravelling now makes its way to the centre:
A self-made treasure approaching its final destiny.


The final rending, the breath of freshness expanding our core,
Also pain most excruciating- is also the most soothing balm-
Which followed the casual prattling of a voice of innocence.
Exhilarating cleansing, leaving a tingle soon recognised
As fresh waves of past and future guilt,
Of the innocent becoming victims,
And victims that become new felons:

And so beginning
A new poem.