Artikel
Welcome to South African Poetry - September 2008
31 augustus 2008
A deep sense of resentment greeted the outpouring of donations in suburbia. Mounds of blankets and foodstuffs, old clothes and toiletries arrived at charitable organisations for distribution at refugee centres. The people howled: Why don’t the rich donate to their own? Why the love for the foreigner? Because they will work for less than we will?
As much as this scenario darkens the heart, the following event brings hope: in the wake of the electoral chaos in neighbouring Zimbabwe a shipment of arms from China, destined for Zimbabwe, was refused permission to unload in Durban harbour. The South African Transport and Allied Workers Union refused to unload the 77-tonne cargo of small arms after the State had issued a clearance permit. Collaboration for the common good in the region prevailed and certain evil and bloodshed was averted.
Jacob Zuma stands trial on charges of fraud and corruption and we watch and wonder at the independence of our ailing judicial system. As the machinations of our own elections start grinding into action an unresolved leadership dithers and dawdles. The man convicted of feeding his farm employee to the lions was released on parole this week after serving just five years of a life sentence, reinforcing the perception that those who are rich and white continue to receive preferential treatment.
While the religious pray, the artists create expressions of our deepest fears and darkest yearnings. In stark colours and bold words they draw the communal hate and hope, painting the hurts, telling the laying down of history in this vibrant resilient nation that refuses to be ordinary.
In this issue, Chris Mann, who actively promotes poetry in South Africa, co-ordinator of Grahamstown’s annual Wordfest, reminds us of the ancient cycles of our evolution as a society in ‘Saying Goodbye to the Romans’:
I go to bed exhilarated, but ill at ease.
How can we show dalesman and chief
that there is no going back to the tribe?
How can we persuade the wild young zealots
to stop harassing the Romans who’ve stayed
and help us build these things called towns?
We remember the magic of performance poet Isabella Motadinyane, a young woman whose life was tragically cut short at the age of forty. She explores the yearning for migration in ‘Work Shire’:
I ran away
skipping the border
and met a man
who said Yorkshire
England is luxury
job seekers
go for it
Another performance poet whose work stands up to scrutiny on the page is Vonani Bila. A publisher in his own right and mentor to many emerging poets, Bila is a fiercely outspoken patriot. In ‘Give Me Love, Rwanda’ he says:
My heart is peaceful, Africa,
But inside is a hole
From a locust and the drought.
My heart is tired.
Flooded by cascades of blood.
We celebrate the work of Megan Hall, who will receive the Ingrid Jonker Poetry Prize next month for her debut collection Fourth Child. She asks a haunting question in ‘Love is a Habit’:
Love is a habit, like brushing your teeth or cleaning the bath.
And if love is a habit, is grieving one too? What shall I replace
the habit of loving and grieving you with?
Petra Müller has also nurtured many new writers, including Etienne van Heerden and Dalene Matthee. It delights us to publish a series of her poems and translations for the first time, and we invite you to draw from the metaphors of ‘Caliban’s Island’:
There was nothing that was clumsy about Caliban, then.
I was an apish emperor, hairy, yes, but filled with an explosive speech,
my lips curved around everything that I had found to say for myself.
It’s an irritable spring in Johannesburg. A late August wind blows hard, whipping winter’s grit and the last brittle leaves into the eyes and ears. Overweening scents of jasmine and acacia blossoms mix with the smoke of veld fires which sting and burn the nose and throat, already friable with dust and pollen. The discontent doesn’t stop there. There’s a restlessness that jitters beyond the bounds of a feverish season, an impatience that is unlikely to fade when the first summer rains hit the hard, parched earth.
South Africans are moody at the moment, restive with xenophobia, stamping the ground for delivery of services, and impatient for justice. Since our last issue in March, hate-filled scenes surfaced in the townships. Neighbours from African countries had their property destroyed, their women raped and more than sixty people were murdered by those who perceive that foreigners are stealing South African jobs.A deep sense of resentment greeted the outpouring of donations in suburbia. Mounds of blankets and foodstuffs, old clothes and toiletries arrived at charitable organisations for distribution at refugee centres. The people howled: Why don’t the rich donate to their own? Why the love for the foreigner? Because they will work for less than we will?
As much as this scenario darkens the heart, the following event brings hope: in the wake of the electoral chaos in neighbouring Zimbabwe a shipment of arms from China, destined for Zimbabwe, was refused permission to unload in Durban harbour. The South African Transport and Allied Workers Union refused to unload the 77-tonne cargo of small arms after the State had issued a clearance permit. Collaboration for the common good in the region prevailed and certain evil and bloodshed was averted.
Jacob Zuma stands trial on charges of fraud and corruption and we watch and wonder at the independence of our ailing judicial system. As the machinations of our own elections start grinding into action an unresolved leadership dithers and dawdles. The man convicted of feeding his farm employee to the lions was released on parole this week after serving just five years of a life sentence, reinforcing the perception that those who are rich and white continue to receive preferential treatment.
While the religious pray, the artists create expressions of our deepest fears and darkest yearnings. In stark colours and bold words they draw the communal hate and hope, painting the hurts, telling the laying down of history in this vibrant resilient nation that refuses to be ordinary.
In this issue, Chris Mann, who actively promotes poetry in South Africa, co-ordinator of Grahamstown’s annual Wordfest, reminds us of the ancient cycles of our evolution as a society in ‘Saying Goodbye to the Romans’:
I go to bed exhilarated, but ill at ease.
How can we show dalesman and chief
that there is no going back to the tribe?
How can we persuade the wild young zealots
to stop harassing the Romans who’ve stayed
and help us build these things called towns?
We remember the magic of performance poet Isabella Motadinyane, a young woman whose life was tragically cut short at the age of forty. She explores the yearning for migration in ‘Work Shire’:
I ran away
skipping the border
and met a man
who said Yorkshire
England is luxury
job seekers
go for it
Another performance poet whose work stands up to scrutiny on the page is Vonani Bila. A publisher in his own right and mentor to many emerging poets, Bila is a fiercely outspoken patriot. In ‘Give Me Love, Rwanda’ he says:
My heart is peaceful, Africa,
But inside is a hole
From a locust and the drought.
My heart is tired.
Flooded by cascades of blood.
We celebrate the work of Megan Hall, who will receive the Ingrid Jonker Poetry Prize next month for her debut collection Fourth Child. She asks a haunting question in ‘Love is a Habit’:
Love is a habit, like brushing your teeth or cleaning the bath.
And if love is a habit, is grieving one too? What shall I replace
the habit of loving and grieving you with?
Petra Müller has also nurtured many new writers, including Etienne van Heerden and Dalene Matthee. It delights us to publish a series of her poems and translations for the first time, and we invite you to draw from the metaphors of ‘Caliban’s Island’:
There was nothing that was clumsy about Caliban, then.
I was an apish emperor, hairy, yes, but filled with an explosive speech,
my lips curved around everything that I had found to say for myself.
© Liesl Jobson
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