KUMKANI MTENGWANA
Two Poems
A Decolonized Silence
I hear that sound in the works of the indigenous doctors
also in the song of gatherings when we unite
to strengthen ancestral bonds, family ties
and community
i hear that sound in the voice of my father
that reminds me of my existential will
to be fully realised
i hear it in my mother’s voice that wakes me up
in the morning, silently
whispering my name
inside of me
i hear that sound in my mother tongue
slowly being muffled out of existence
by the undying repercussions
of colonialism
Ancestral Voices (For Eugene Skeef)
As the day’s illumination dies
your ancient whispers summon the moon
with an ever present army of constellations
In the great abyss of our minds
she is the light and her hosts
the entourage of divinity
Their voices we hear them singing
melancholic overtones
like a bull at a slaughter
gasping for its last breath
Their eyes are as bright as the furnace
that outshines the hosts
as we bask in the light of her grace
You are the star people forever praised
by the fertile ground we once freely walked upon
vibrating our footsteps in
Tantric dances
You watch with contempt as your seed grows
on fields filled with concrete rocks
which constitute yield of rotten fruit
that no longer knows nor gives praise to you
Your ears hear the lies they tell
when they excavate your graves
to assay your age and origin,
to place you in theatrical prisons
in an attempt to dismantle you from the moist roots
of baobab trees that have quenched your thirst
throughout the ages
Yet like a mother after miscarriage
you still sing a lullaby for your undead infant
as her grave silence after
birth is resuscitated
by a mother’s voice
yearning
for the rise of a nation
