Gert Strydom, 28 july 2016
To the front in the road
blue Metro traffic cop lights flash,
a roadblock is set up and pistols
are aimed at the occupants of a car
in the bright daylight
and bombs are removed from the criminals
which the PCF-community guard report
was meant for the blowing up of teller machines.
An armoured car parks at a bank
where four guards with machineguns
and two with money canisters jump out
and one of them commands me to halt
when on the sidewalk I want to pass
and all of them become very angry
when I do not take notice of their antics
and screaming.
At times I do hear jets bursting through the sound barrier,
see the snow-white lines against the bright blue sky
when I hang the washing
and wait upon the winter sun to bake everything dry.
Right through the night my dogs bark
at a police helicopter
that swishes up and down
our well to do suburb
and it hits me when we drive into the garage at home
that unknowing we may be living in a war zone
but it is safe where we live
behind steel palisades, barred windows
and steel gates
with a emergency button to press
for the ADT-security’s armed response
that arrives within five minutes.
[Reference: PCF = Police Community Forum.]
Satish Verma, 28 july 2016
Sleep me, conceive me like sphagnum;
propel me to essence of death.
Seeing has put me behind the truth,
objectively.
Like centipede, fear crawls in deep blind cave
throwing the feelers.
The gene has faltered. No red lights.
A paw, a blackboard, white lines
message is not clear.
My absent candles are freaking in wormy
darkness, noiselessly. The solitude
trying to gather the words.
Listen to time clock. Past and future.
Present has held the lantern to see
the hands moving. Sound comes out
clearly from the prophets of galaxies.
I want to catch the winds
in my legs to blast the horror of life,
underside of the gnarled credibility.
The rains are coming.
Gert Strydom, 27 july 2016
When the sun does flower outside
the children want to rollick
but you are still asleep
and will not be ready for some time.
You are glued to the mirror
and with your DD-breasts you are too fat in your own mind
while you do look at yourself in your scanty bikini
where you do have a perfect figure.
On the beach I do apply sun-tanning lotion to your body
where you sit under the shading umbrella
while every man does watch you
and from behind sunglasses you do peep at the other people.
Every afternoon we eat at a restaurant
on the edge of the beach
where you order seafood and the children feast on their steaks
and you do regard the holiday as miserable
even when we do drive out to places
and the children want to stay forever at the sea.
Satish Verma, 27 july 2016
And everyday we talk about the sinister designs
of semilunar nights to rob us of our days
when the sleep was far away chasing the sleep
and the crumbeled continuity of a tale lay unpeeled.
How to highlight the dates on our calenders?
You keep forgetting even the years
when your forefathers left.
And deep in the green grass the names were wiped out.
Winged days were shot down after returning homes,
late evening, when listening to commentaries on death
and reviving myths of blissful healing
from reincarnated saints.
The pseudo-dementia, scented jasmines,
flickering flames, leaking petroleum,
human torch,
and your non-stop crying.
All night the onion breath blows on my sweaty face.
Tomorrow morning I will walk with
my shirt ripened with stains
where my heart had bled.
Gert Strydom, 26 july 2016
I yearn for the secrets of nature
where wild game graze next to the dust road
and I long for the veldt where it is silent,
silent from the bustle of the city,
where the sky has an own blue hue,
where the rain comes in the afternoon with thundershowers
and you can see interesting things if you look carefully,
can be astonished by insects, animals and flowers
but in the city I hear the turbines of Impala platinum singing continually,
are choking from the coal smoke from the squatter camp that is nearby
and on the highway people are angry and cannot restrain themselves,
at factories in the distance I notice pollution and vapour,
the money machines at Carnival casino jingle without end
and on Friday afternoons the whistling of the alarms echo
when poisonous gasses and dangerous things build up at the factories
and it is at these times that I want to leave the city,
go back to the veldt where you can find the works of God
and be able to believe in Him with the faith of a child.
Satish Verma, 26 july 2016
The template had the fault,
I was buried alive.
Brick by brick they erected the cell
around me.
I could see only the reflection
of a moon at night
in my glass of water.
During the day sun peeped through the cracks,
was hurting and very disturbing,
forming a skull and crossed bones
on the walls.
I watched a piece of sky
as a hub of pallisades.
I planted a word in that hole.
After one seed, there were many
echoes. Starting in the distant hills.
I was rising in red fog.
Gert Strydom, 25 july 2016
At 52 the nuts of my country are stripped
so that nothing can fit together anymore
and everything in my world has changed.
At work I have been retrenched
and I can get no other work
in my profession
(for which a person does need a university degree
or two)
where the past of other people
is now catching up with me
as my country has experienced affirmative action
and that just for some people.
Some young people who are already mature
do attend church
but are not interested to be baptised,
do not even live out the principles
of that religion
and young girls in mini dresses
that is so short that you can see their panties
do lead out the song service from up front
and they do pray to daddy God
while a older gentleman
do scream in a black native language
on someone that whispers in an emergency during a service.
People do walk over others from their own people
to fit into the political correctness
where they work at the police or civil service
and the Yin-Yang (good and evil),
the point of view that every person is a god
and for others the prosperity religion
that does believe that those who are prosperous
are the only ones that are blessed by God
is very popular.
There are many old people who are an embarrassment
to their children,
and they are suffering from misery and poverty.
Some young children have got to wait a turn
to eat or not
and I do talk to God
over all of these things when I do kneel down to pray.
Gert Strydom, 25 july 2016
At night I have the strangest dream
where all of my hope is swept away
but everything is not how it does seem.
At night I have the strangest dream
but in love you do vow and deem
to love me past every night and day
but at night I have the strangest dream
where all of my hope is swept away
Gert Strydom, 24 july 2016
(in answer to Patrick Cullinan)
At early morning dawn
eighteen big busses appear
some with Putco, Morning Star
and others with Amagolang signs on them
and on their top roof racks.
Everything is loaded from blankets,
wheelbarrows, chicken coops to primus stoves.
Durban’s South beach, North Beach
and Country Club
are packed with a throng
of black tourists everywhere,
who unclothe right there in public
and swim in all colours of underpants,
in white, cream and pink bras and panties
with black nipples and private parts
shining through when wet
and some old black grannies fill bottles
with sea water and a bit of sand
believing that it’s good medicine
while some chickens
in a great tumult of noise
are brought out of a cage,
are beheaded with a shining axe,
are plucked and on tent poles
spit fried on the beach.
Some men and boys
pull their pants down
and urinate near to a water tap
while others wait in line
at the toilets which are filled
past capacity.
[Reference: “The beach, the evening” by Patrick Cullinan.]
Satish Verma, 24 july 2016
Meditation was futile.
He turned his back
from the green prayers.
The state had made a mockery of his love.
The words were not clear
written on the periphery of pain.
He fathered
dust to dust, his light
folded his trembling hands,
lying on jaundiced bed.
Syntax was rising.
He stood alone amidst landmines
malice for none, beast and history.
The stones were falling from sky.
The punished was partaking the blows,
where he was
others were absent.
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