The rituals of men
Are told in dead silence
In the morning
We wake up to pick broken bones
Pieces of flesh and skin
Scattered weeping spirits
And wash away the smell
Of blood from the air we breathe
With our tears who no longer cry
For another dead sister
Our brothers
Enjoy planting at night
All the pain we harvest
With hushed tones
At sunrise
Our tired bodies
Have become a sad place
Where mourners dwell
Waiting
For their graves
To call their names
We sit
Preparing our bones
For the breaking
Of skin
And cutting
Of flesh
And spilling
Of our blood,
Maybe tonight
I will be the feast
Of a man’s fury
And a rain of fists
Maybe I will be the ash
Of the fire in his eyes
Maybe I will be a cold victim
An end
Or a warm survivor
Who prays to a silent god
To command the bleeding ground
To swallow her whole.
Siphiwe Hlongwane is a writer of words pretending to be poems and short stories.
His work has appeared on Poetry Potion, Praxis Magazine Online, FunDza.Mobi and forthcoming on Kalahari Review.