Ten Years Across the Limpopo

Ten Years Across the Limpopo

Ten Years Across the Limpopo

After ten years
across the Limpopo
what he brought back home
is this:
a fruit knife
known as okapi
the clothes on his back
a small radio
and the deadly
disease that’s eating him.
Delirious rumblings
of a good time
in Jozi.
The delicious
chocolate brown
Mzansi thighs
in rare coherent moments
he talks of getting stung
in between the things
of the beautiful
money-squandering Mzansi women.
In tears mama says
he should have come earlier
and gotten on the programme
like the girl next door.
After ten years
across the Limpopo
all he brought
is the disease sending him to his grave.