My words don’t matter when they fall on deaf ears
They are like dreams beat by time, quickly forgotten
I am a lone tree in the Kalahari facing sand storms
That shout: obey, comply, never defy
My thoughts are futile wanderers with no spark
They have no fuel to drive their existence
They will never give delight, scourge anger or plough insight
Their only strength is to drive me crazy
They pose wonder and hope:
‘Will there ever be a time for us?’
‘Will there ever be a time to live free…?’
Free from bondage
Free from judgement
Free from fear
Black lives matter, White lives matter, All lives matter!
So many a times other poets ask these questions yet till this day we still wonder, not only in Africa with American police related news to European and football players’ constant cries it just feels like the poetic voice has lost its tone to the people. So this poem expresses all that stress. So many times we are expected to follow without questioning, I try to entice the reader to rebel from these rules. I believe the reader will feel the stress and themselves seek a solution as to how they can face the matter. ‘Questions are stepping stones to wisdom, the more you ask the clearer you see and seeing in clarity is the only kind of wisdom there is’.
I’m still at awe to learn that in 2016, the world is so far aback when it comes to matters of race and freedom. As civilised society we are gradually improving as a people but it just hurts to see that people are still holding on to their aristocratic prejudicial ways in what we South Africans call the new world. In this piece I voice my cries as a poet; you see a lot of people plead death to poetry but this is not true as poetry is creation, expression and sharing and that is part of our daily lives. I express my wonder. Was it all true when we celebrated in the1990s I wonder if other people see value in their own democracy and if maybe one day we will ever share equivalent freedoms as a Rainbow Nation? (I use the ‘Equivalent’ because money nullifies the value of ‘Equality’ in the case of ‘FREEDOMS’ we can all enjoy)
