Gert Strydom, 15 january 2014
At birth we enter this world
from the great unknown
and make life our very own
as human beings with senses
of touch, hearing and seeing
and from being born we are on a sojourn
as travellers that feel and experience
the way that life is
and we do reach to each other in bliss
and true happiness
while we do work, play and laugh and cry
until the very day that we die.
Gert Strydom, 14 january 2014
Darling, when you were with me
we walked through the hillocks,
searched for small gazelle
as if we would find them
while continually we were happy
and at times it felt
as if we could catch the golden sun.
Gert Strydom, 10 january 2014
I remember your green-brown eyes
innocently finding mine,
how your mouth noticeable did twitch
and how totally blinded
I thought that you were an angel
and unaware of the church
for half an hour looked at you.
Gert Strydom, 9 january 2014
To me you are the most precious and beautiful of women
someone that believes in me
while life comes daily with a new kind of omen
and although our love is how it ought to be
still I want to cherish you, and I want to do
the things that will make you happy
as all of my feelings are true
and you are someone really great to me.
Gert Strydom, 8 january 2014
There was a moment that I knew you are wonderful, my wife,
when you did treat me as if I am your very own
and in your heart there was much more than just pity
when you did trust me with your heart’s deepest secrets
but to every moment I do not want to cling
as in every other experience
there is a kind of deeper knowledge
as if days with greater promises will continue.
It’s as if I find something beautiful in everything of you
and there is greater value to even the most insignificant thing
as if everything makes a person more bonded and happy
and when at times you and I are lost like children
it’s as if greater and better things just wait to jump into each day
and life continually becomes better in the grace of God.
Gert Strydom, 6 january 2014
The act of love brings men and women to their delight
whereas the art of love burns
like a candle through the darkest night
and involves the mind, body and soul
and makes even broken people whole
and in a world where passions reign
and embodies the wonder of being alive
love does much more than making love contain
as at its heart lies a kind of sincerity
that binds and makes a person free,
that takes away the sin from sin
when with true love
mere men and women do begin
when making love is a mortal thing
and true love is a gift from the godly being.
Gert Strydom, 2 january 2014
Reckless you wait in my dreams
with a pouting mouth
and at times I dream of us both
being together on holy ground
where the mere presence of God
does fathom love
but in life day and night interchanges
while love does bind us
with a kind of magic power.
Gert Strydom, 31 december 2013
In this stretched out country
many an Afrikaner is stranded
and we are all bound to the ground
to a place that at times wound us deadly
but daily we do still see the sun shine,
do notice how the late afternoon does disappear
and at night the stars glisten in their beauty
before the next sunny day.
Some people still live with integrity
in love, sadness and in joy
in a world where murder and robbery
reach each one at a time,
where every silent word and deed do reach out far
and people also want a place in the sun,
want to rest in peace at night in their beds
but still every day is full of oppression and violence
and nobody is free of this.
Gert Strydom, 30 december 2013
Daily we live in the marketplace of the world
where almost everything is for sale
and there we do find
things for our daily well-being,
the food we eat,
the clothes we wear,
the houses wherein we do dwell,
the jobs that we do labour at,
places where we do keep fit,
people that help to keep us healthy,
education and our knowledge of things
that does exist,
religion and the way that we do understand God
and in the cinemas and on television
a kind of tinned-in quick-fix comfort
for the soul.
Even the bodies of people,
weapons of war,
war itself
and politics
and at times even the lives
of men as soldiers
are traded
in the world where we do live
but I do recall a time
where the omnipotent God
did dwell among men as a man,
did lash out with His tongue and a whip
and did trade His very life
for the lives of everyone
to pay the wages of sin.
Gert Strydom, 27 december 2013
Far too much I miss you and far too much
is the longing
as if my whole life and everything
do depend upon you.
How I am and what I can become
looses importance
when you are away and loneliness does come
and with your love I am still astounded.
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