THE POET'S FAILURE Poem by Mxolisi Nyezwa

we had words in us that we never said.
we could stand in these waterless alleys
and march into the wet rain.

we smelled like starved rogues, we stank
like dying corpses
sailing the warm winds of our silence,
searching in reckless shelters to cool our lips.

we struggled begging conciliation
down the trodden tracks of cold hurricanes
seeking out lost igloos,
we had words within these day-long blues -

driven by cold emotions into the shades and shadows
of a dying land, we had words that choked to be said -
and we never said them.