VONANI BILA

I

Under these tall umbrella thorn trees
My ancestors dwell 
Jonas is buried in a woven grass kenya[1]A woven grass mat used to roof huts. Among the Vatsonga, this mat was also used to wrap and preserve the corpse of a poor person who couldn’t afford a decent blanket or linen. 
When Dayimani woke up dead at 10 am
he was buried in the afternoon, the same day 
his body covered with white linen and a thin blanket
My ancestors dwell here 
seated, facing home in the east
facing Bileni, far away in Mozambique 
A broken mattress and xihlungwani[2]A carved wooden crown that is used to close the top of a grass thatched hut. Among the Vatsonga, when the head of a family dies, the xihlungwani is removed to indicate that he is no more and the place is usually referred to as emachihweni.  heaped on the grave
Cracked enamel plates and mugs heaped on the grave

II

Papa, when you finally got admitted at Giyani Block 
we thought the learned doctors who can see what’s hidden in blood and water
would remove these needles 
and pins and spears in your veins and wearied bones
But their bewitched, green-red flashing machines in theatre confirmed you healthy 
And when you got into the late-night train to Ga-Rankuwa Hospital, 
far away in Pretoria, on that ultra-distant bumpy ride
we thought the learned doctors would have removed this excruciating pain 
in your chest and packing-up bones

But doctors in white gowns saw no fault in your stuttering engine
They sent you home
You got into that long, bumpy train uncured
They asked you to come with your wife on 4 December 1989 
for possible heart surgery 
And the next day you came back home 
sat with your family around the fire
That night you didn’t cough blood clots, nor groan
that night you didn’t vomit 
nor was your body a river of sweat 
Your face was sunbeaming
Blue eyes were shining

We ate chicken stew and pap
drank rooibos tea with buttered bread 
That night owls and the wind didn’t howl in trees 
The mountain snake and dzelehani[6]A tiny nocturnal animal (bushbaby) with a cry like a human baby, usually considered a bad omen.  didn’t cry 
Dogs and cats didn’t wail or mew
That night I slept like a baby

Under these tall umbrella thorn trees
My ancestors rise and hold hands
They sing in unison 
Dance in rhythmic step
Around the fire 

III

Wednesday 13 September 1989, 1 am:
You asked Mother to extinguish the paraffin lamp 
burning on the polished red cement floor 
The time to switch off your tormented heartbeat had beckoned
that day you requested mhani N’wa-Noel 
your concubine from Mbhokota
to sleep in the grass-thatched rondavel with your girl children 
Because the last night of intimacy 
and pain belonged to your wife, Fokisa N’wa-Mahatlani,
your black beauty of twenty-six years
Yena wa ka mkhamu wa nsuku na ngwavila (She whose body glitters with gold and gems)
Mbati ya ku fuma (The door to wealth)

Your last night belonged to your wife 
who birthed you seven healthy children
Children born between 1964 and 1980
The last night to outline your will –
because you knew n’wana wa munhu u le kusuhani[9]The Son of Man is nearby, meaning Jesus is coming. 
The last night to outline how your homestead should be run 
so that you don’t return home wearing shorts
and run riot
In case your house was turned into a playground
Emachihweni[10]A deserted place usually occasioned by the passing of the head of a family. This metaphor implies that when the head of the family dies, there is a strong possibility of lawlessness, hunger, starvation, cheating and immorality in the family., emathumbhanini[11]Children’s makeshift abode of reeds or cardboard or other scraps, usually used for early sexual experimentation. 
You sat on your three-quarter bed 
wearing that striped, brown T-shirt from Pep Stores[12]Chaîne sud-africaine de magasins vendant des vêtements bon marché.
eyes fixed on the leaking old zinc roof

Then you paged through the Old Mutual policy document
and you said: 
Mhana Oom 
the roof is old
I have bought the bricks
but they’ll not be enough to build a decent house
When they give you my little pension fund
build a house:
A room for Oom, a room for Simon, another room for Makhanani and Julia
If God had given me seven more years to live
Oom and Simon would be working
They would take care of Makhanani and Julia

Then the burning paraffin lamp was extinguished:
Each sleeping in their separate three-quarter bed
Suddenly a heavy hand whipped Mother’s shoulder
It was her grandmother, N’wa-Xakhombo,
whose voice shrieked: 
Pfuka wena N’wa-Mafelalomo! (Wake up, you who die in far distant places!)
A wu swi voni leswaku wa weriwa? (Don’t you see the roof is falling, collapsing upon you?)

All she heard was one groan:
Hhmmm, hmmmm! 
And Papa, when she came to your three-quarter bed
Daniel Risimati Bila, the son of Dayimani and N’wa-Zulu
had packed for good
Papa, your room was filled with cold air
Misty cloudy smog covered the room at 1 am
Mama says you didn’t hit or kick the walls violently 
as you wrestled with the monster

Kwalaho ndzi n’wi longa (Then I laid out his body)
Ndzi koka minkumba ndzi zola milenge (I removed the blankets and elevated his legs)
Ndzi lola mavoko ya longoloka na yena (I elevated his hands and arms along his body)
Ndzi vuyetela mahlo (I gently closed his eyes with a simple touch)
Ndzi n’wi sula xikandza (I wiped down his face)
A hlambile a nga se etlela (He had bathed before bedtime)
Mapfalo ya mina a ma file (I didn’t feel any remorse)[13]For having wanted to commit suicide
Ivi ndzi khomelela mubedwa (Then I held the bed so firm)
ndzi ku kumbe u ta pfuka (thinking that he would wake up)

She searched for Rattex in the wardrobe
If she had found it,
she would have crushed it,
swallowed it to burn her liver and heart
and join you in the other world
How would she raise her children
with cents from selling bananas and tomatoes
at the Elim market?

Under these tall umbrella thorn trees
My ancestors rise and hold hands
They sing in unison 
Dance in rhythmic step
Around the fire 

IV

‘My time to go has arrived,’ you told Mother several times 
The ZCC prophets Markos Mukhuva and vho-Ramantshwane 
Had tearfully told you the same at Magangeni church:
‘Your life’s ticket is over’
They told you a few months before your departure
to the land yonder
They told you to stop chasing after the skirts
because skirts were cloths covering a big bottomless pit 
And you came home to tell your wife
you were not taking anyone’s cows or calves in the kraal
but helping the wandering women in need

You lived facing the tomb
facing the red setting sun
knowing your living days 
were vanishing fast like paraffin paper fire
You lived facing the tomb
knowing you couldn’t afford skipping monthly subscriptions 
to Saffas the undertaker in Louis Trichardt 
because the ancestors emaxubini[15]In the ruins were calling you

You lived facing the tomb 
That’s why you cleared the bushy shrubs 
making the road with a pick and shovel
making the road with a spade and hoe 
because you wanted the hearse 
to collect your remains at home with ease
Because you didn’t want to be loaded in a wheelbarrow 
and driven to be collected at the main road
watched by birds, monkeys and stray dogs

You lived facing the tomb
because Papa, something so sharp was piercing you 
needles stinging your veins with deadly venom 
nails biting your flesh
the sharp spear jabbing your heart 
Something so sharp was numbing your veins
Draining your energy from your bowels
You breathed heavily every time you climbed a steep hill

You coughed strenuously, sneezing, lungs rattling
Sometimes you collapsed on the narrow paths 
after vomiting blood, groaning, vomiting air 
Sometimes you bellowed 
like someone who had eaten fresh poison

But Papa, you carried the burden of a family man
on your shoulders,
working every day of the week
Slowly walking ten kilometres every day
to Elim Hospital
For all these thirty years
helping doctors carry out postmortems –
cutting through skulls, stitching and cleaning the dead so stinking 
Burying the dead in black shrouds at ten o’clock every day
behind the hospital sewerage

Papa, you did everything at Elim Hospital: 
Ferrying patients to theatre
Feeding relieved mothers at the maternity wards
Scrubbing the floor in the Eye Department 
Papa, you did everything at Elim Hospital
for a paltry R300 salary in 1989
because you had beaks to feed
and backs to clothe

Under these tall umbrella thorn trees
My ancestors rise like elephants 
at the break of dawn
to drink water
 from the mountain’s fountain 

V

Saturday 26 September 1989 we hid you
in this sacred ground where shoes are taken off
It’s not a cemetery for commoners
it’s not Mazokhele nor Avalon
It’s the Bila gardens, within my yard
It’s a pity you spent two weeks in those mortuary pans
Ice must have burnt your skin and bones
silencing the sense of hearing that never dies
burning the growing beard and hair 
When Saffas brought you home at dusk on Friday
in that dark hearse 
candles and a paraffin lamp burnt the whole night 
in your lonely bedroom
The funeral parlour had bathed you 
dressed you in a white silky shroud 
Mother and the elderly women wearing blankets 
slept on the floor around the coffin the whole night
in your two-roomed house
Papa, when you left us
your three-quarter bed was removed from the room
put outside the house against the tree
I was a small boy of seventeen
doing Standard Nine at Lemana High
For days I didn’t go to school
Even though a ka ha ri vusiku[17]I was in the dark, meaning: I wasn’t yet involved with girls. 
The elders said ku fanele ku songiwa masangu[18]Proverb meaning: Mats must be folded. In other words, all sexual relations are prohibited.
I listened to Ta lava hundzeke emisaveni[19]For the deceased. The name of a regular programme on radio Tsonga in the 1980s. on Radio Tsonga 
to hear your name mentioned on that dreadful programme 
At 7 am, your light brown casket covered with a blanket 
was displayed in the courtyard
We walked around it to view you for the last time
People cried, some fell to the ground so hard
It was the first time I saw a dead man
and the fallen man was my father,
who on that fateful night 
told mom that had he known
that he would die prematurely
he wouldn’t have fathered his four last children,
including Oom

So I viewed you for the last time on earth
and I shed no tear because death had long come
I had seen you walk away
eaten by an illness no doctor could detect
The night before the funeral
I sat around the big fire –
Reverend Chabalala was preaching in the crowded tent
Papa, know that John Zulu, your uncle, donated a beast for the funeral
It was slaughtered eka Mapuve 
80 kilometres away from Elim/Shirley 
Papa, know that people spoke so well at your burial 
Elias Machume was the programme director
Hahani[20]Aunt N’wa-Risimati Xisana, in tears, 
informed the mourners about your death
and asked your ancestors, Dayimani the son of Jonas
Jonas the son of Makhayingi
Makhayingi wa Mpfumari
Mpfumari wa Xanjhinghu
Xanjhinghu wa Ntshovi
Ntshovi wa Xisilafole xi nga ri na nhonga xi sila hi mandla[21]He who crushes [tobacco] without a mortar and pestle but with bare hands.
to receive you on the other side
Your brother John Bila who had disappeared for more than twenty years
came back home the day you died
He trembled, speaking on behalf of the family
Can’t remember what he said, because he said nothing, but cried
Your wife’s brother JS Mashele also paid tribute to you
Even your colleagues from Elim Hospital came in numbers
They sang hymns melodically
P Mathavha spoke on behalf of the ZCC
Meriam Shetlele represented the neighbourhood 
Thomas Mahlasela read the wreaths 
Sivara[22]Brother-in-law Rev Maluleke, the short and handsome friend of yours, 
carried your coffin to the grave
The ZCC mokhukhu[23]Mokhukhu (Sepedi) Shack dwelling. In this poem, this word refers to the Zion Christian Church’s organised, rhythmic, male dance which is characterised by frequent and collective
leaps into the air and coming down stamping their feet on the ground with their white boots called manyanyatha. Usually, the mokhukhu performances last for hours, with no meals in-between, the dancers drinking only sugarless tea and mogabolo (holy and blessed water) before the performance. The mokhukhu dancers are usually called mashole a thapelo, meaning the soldiers of prayer. men danced in khaki and manyanyatha
Chonaphi Cawuke, Phineas N’wavungavunga, Shilowa, 
Mahanci and Xikhudu, the great dancers were there 
The yard was full of mourners 
men wearing jackets and women draped in blankets 
Even The Lion of Judah, your first wife’s brother, was there!
He gave the vote of thanks with his moving coarse voice 
Mourners contributed cash –
it was recorded in a book. It was good money.
But some members of my family with long fingers
never showed all the money to my mother
I was still small, Papa. But I’ve forgiven these thieves
We planted your remains
filled the grave with blood red soil
It had a hump like a bull
The elderly planted maize, beans, corn and pumpkins 
Inviting the rain to come 
because your death was never going to bring famine 
and starvation in this house
The elderly placed coins and your preferred drinking mug and plate
on the grave
We laid you beside your mother Makhanani N’wa-Zulu
who died on 16 November 1980
and your father Dayimani who died in June 1964
A white cross marked your name:
Daniel Risimati Bila
Rest in peace

Under these tall umbrella thorn trees
My ancestors rise and hold hands
They sing in unison 
Dance in rhythmic step
Around the fire 

VI

Papa, you came home to rest forever
because Giyani Block breeds the pungent death smell
Shallow-breathing skeletons crumble in the crowded ward
with no family member to preserve their sanity 
The jaws lock, eyes fixed
and the white pupils enlarged in the light so bright

Papa, you came home to rest forever
because shivering patients with bluish lips 
watch tearfully as the final air bursts from the belly 
of a patient next door, bursting like a detonated bomb
misty air blackening the ward with coldness

The restless patients with irregular pulse 
watch helplessly as the nurses remove the linen 
with that last stinking black stool
Transferring this man who died in the night to another ward – 
next to a living patient in a single room 
The living patient is happy he’s got a neighbour 
but the neighbour is fast asleep, wearing a shroud 
The new neighbour is neither hungry nor thirsty
The living starts to hallucinate
gets lost in nappies 
Now he knows the nurses brought him a strange ghost 
who’ll gnaw at his dreams

Papa, you came home to rest forever
because in this hospital, like in many hospitals
just an hour after someone has been confirmed dead by the doctor
the nurses make up the same bed
A new patient sleeps in there comfortably 
He doesn’t know someone has just died there 
He collects the spirit of the dead

In the middle of the night
the new patient rushes to the toilet to pray
pleading to see his only son from Joburg 
And when his son arrives the next morning
and holds his father’s cold hand 
the old man opens his mouth with difficulty
as if to say, my son take care of my cattle
But no word shoots from the mouth layered with white foam
and again goes another patient 
in broad daylight
 
Papa, you came home to rest forever
because the groaning and wailing movie never stops in the hospital 
Some pale-faced patients urinate in coffee mugs and plates 
the very same mugs they use for coffee and tea
Some patients jump from the bed like impalas
tearing drips and tubes away
They race around the ward wearing the catheters 
bubbling with urine tea 
They too scream in hallucination: 
Nurse, come and help
They are here with knives
They want to suffocate me
They want to cut my throat

In the intensive care unit, someone is motionless
trapped in intubation,
His car rolled three times into the donga
his head was almost crushed 
perhaps he’s brain-dead 
but the heart is still beating slowly
The nurses feed him
they change his nappies every hour
His family won’t allow the medics to 
switch off the life-support machine 
because though he’s brain-dead
miracles can still happen

they happened in the days of Jesus Christ
And when his spear suddenly rises
the nurses know the brain-dead patient’s life ticket is still intact 

Some burnt-out nurses simply talk on cellphones 
Watching this ongoing groaning and vomiting and shitting drama
But you Papa, you didn’t want to die in hospital 
like your mother Makhanani N’wa-Zulu
who spent five months at Shangaan Block without eating
or going to the toilet on her own
My grandmother who died alone
who, when her coffin was opened for viewing,
even a brave man like you Papa cried,
because there was no one to close her mouth

Papa, you came home to rest forever 
like Dayimani your father
and Jonas your grandfather
and Makhayingi your great-grandfather
You came home to rest forever 
after a family meal
in the hands of your wife
in your bed
in the morning so still

VII

If you were alive today, madala –
I’d buy you a suit and soft ostrich-skin shoes
I’d fly you to Durban or Cape Town
So you can walk on the beach
feel the soft grains of summer sand
I’d take you out to sit-down restaurants
to try out shrimps, mussels and this good food I eat

If you were alive today, madala –
We would plant avocado and litchi trees
Grow spinach and beetroot together
Pinch and prune the sweetest tomatoes that yield
You would teach me how to dig a trench 
How to prepare a seedbed for seedlings 
How to make ridges and furrows 
How to mulch and make compost and manure
How to save water and use grey water
We would grow those red roses 
and maintain those white lilies 
We would do gardening on our ancestral land
singing your song:
7/8 u ya lithanda isaka la mazambani
U ya lithanda isaka la mazambani[24]An isiZulu song particularly liked by the poet’s father. The composer is not known, but the song was performed by a male song-and-dance troupe during his father’s school days at Shirley Agricultural and Industrial School for Natives, and during the potato tasting festivities organised by the Swiss missionary and liberal, Herbert Stanley Phillips, and his wife, Lucette Phillips, at Shirley farm.

If you were alive today, madala –
You would tell me how you survived the white dog 
that followed you every morning to work 
The dog that would run fast past you
The strange dog that would slide through your legs 
or even hit your legs with its tail 
The dog that walked ahead of you
The dog that numbed your feet
The dog that shook and wearied your bones 
The dog that disappeared at the bus stop 
just before the hospital gate
The same white vaveni[25]Tokoloshe, evil spirit or voodoo  that received you back from work
but couldn’t enter the gate to your house
to throw you into a grave

If you were alive today, madala –
You would tell me about that rope 
that roamed in your nightmares 
The rope that made you so impatient, 
that made you hate everything about your wife 

The rope that made you hit her
and want to kill her with a knife 
The rope of which prophet Muvhangeli said: 
U nga yi rhwaleli loko u yi vona endleleni ya wena 
(Don’t pick it up when you find it placed on your path) 
The tough rope of wicked relatives
who had long sized your neck

If you were alive today, madala –
You would tell me how you and Ngholeni picked up that dead rabbit 
early in the morning on your way to work 
How you skinned the rabbit with delight
How you wanted to cook it for lunch
When suddenly a strange man came 
and touched your forehead
and said, ‘and hi yena papantsongo wa Frank.’[26]And he’s the one who is Frank’s uncle 
Then your forehead ached and pounded
and when you came back home from work
The same strange man
hobbled to your house
All he said was one sentence:
I needed to find Frank’s brother’s place 
Then he vanished
stealing your heart 
placing it in a cave
planting a cockerel’s heart in you 
and you coughed and coughed

VIII

Papa, I know it took us twenty years to erect your tombstone
All along the wind was blowing you away
The sun was burning you
Your pillow was your hand 
But now Bila, Mhlahlandlela, rest in peace
Do not open the grave and come home wearing shorts
Since you left, your wife has remained in the house
I’ve not seen a man sitting on your chair
It’s still your house
Full of trees and vegetables
 
7/8 u ya lithanda isaka la mazambani
U ya lithanda isaka la mazambani