Gert Strydom, 15 april 2016
They were tough men who believed in God
who used the holy word and the rod,
ancestors from Dutch and French Huguenot stock,
farmed with vineyards and livestock,
and our language and customs, to some odd
came from centuries that were harsh and hot,
where people herded sheep into a flock
from frontier life, where small children could cock
a rifle and could the hinterland unlock,
could fire at moving targets while at speed
but the British came to cause some amok,
destroyed women, children saw the need
to plunder, pillage, to burn, to kill, to shock
to make Christians, another nation bleed.
[Note by poet: This poem is written in remembrance of the twenty thousand (some figures are as high as thirty five thousand) innocent white Afrikaner women and children that died in British concentration camps, after their farms were scorched by the British in the Anglo-Boer war in South Africa, which includes a great grandmother of mine. For a clear picture of these atrocities read my epic poem “Through the eyes of a field coronet” which is based on the eyewitness account of field coronet JJ Potgieter.]
Gert Strydom, 14 april 2016
Lord, only in Your footsteps there is life for me
and Your life sets me free from all of my iniquity
but every day I do struggle and fall
to stay step upon step with Thee.
Satish Verma, 14 april 2016
It was not like life.
I am worried,
they were hitting the womb.
Social support for surgery.
The hills were crying.
A ring of fog was disturbing.
The elements and spasticity.
Brain leaves a trail of acid.
They were killing the genes.
For the proud generator
over the deaf and dumb
lies the chanting crown.
Terror and the battle of garden,
edge of revenge
annihilates the light!
Gert Strydom, 13 april 2016
An orange-red sickle moon hangs low
above the light speckled darkened land
while all of the neighbourhood is asleep
and thoughts do into my mind creep
when I hear great paws walking outside on the sand
and in my heart a speck of fear does grow
as if something unknown wants to from the darkness reach
and everything outside is not how it does appear
when there is a rattling at the pane and a violent scratch
and in the blue-white glow of a lighted match
an unknown black predatory form draws near
while far away the waves roll in and out on the beach.
Satish Verma, 13 april 2016
He turns, forgets the hollyhocks
tries to become human
accepts the stupidity.
When he could not help the hops
closed the door
and gave sermons.
A horny hooch
or judgement on honeydew
was tossed in dust-bin for integrity.
And deep in river
a crocodile dies
for underwater truth.
Chastity was in peril
tormented by creativity
of the underground.
Renato N. Mascardo, 12 april 2016
quiet
of daybreak torn
by a lone sparrow's trill
a matutinal song longing for
its mate
renato
12 april 2016
Nesca, 12 april 2016
There was a chance.
A little one, it's in stitches now
but it smelled amazing.
Almost like the ocean.
I aborted that chance.
For us, for all of it.
Everything just so you can
make another fake promise.
For a new chance, a new cycle.
Gert Strydom, 12 april 2016
Far too quickly time rushes on
and the happy days of youth are gone
and the company of your love does disappear
and you are the only lonely one
Satish Verma, 12 april 2016
Do you need a sanitizer for contaminated hands?
They were busy in illustrating the ugly contours
of life.
Up and down you were out of joint,
and your feet were not fastened to the ground.
Untainted a shrill voice prepares to rise
from the sullen men
huddled on the floor,
for the sad demise of a grand master.
The green truth was nowhere to be seen.
People are getting down for a feast
to invoke peace for the departed soul.
I am miserable,
cannot blast the fake ceremony.
Year after year the doomed city performs a ritual
for the coronation of a new king.
The sky is divided by domes, towers, minarets
and tall turrets.
cannot see the moon clearly at night
I reject the old abstractions
draw the ink from the blood
and paint a tarantula.
Gert Strydom, 11 april 2016
Like any other person my hands are stained by Your blood
but every sin and my own will
and everything that can bring separation between us
are covered by Your wondrous blood.
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