Excerpt: ’94 by Zama Madinana

song for mashombela

no wrinkles can dim

the light

of your smile

 

it silences

the choirs of confusion

on a stage of fear

 

your love

devours the towers

of despair

 

mama

i wish to sit in the lap

of your strength

 

and enjoy the lullabies

of your compassion

sending my stubborn nightmares to sleep

 

while my baby-mind

hungers

for the breasts of your wisdom

 

and my back

dances to a freedom song

that lives in the palm of your hand

 

as you wield your sharp tongue

to wean me from my plate of ignorance

let me grow to be a man who despises arrogance

 

if winter days of my life come

i want to find warmth in the rooms

of your laughter

 

not in the dingy taverns

of this township

that turn family men

into

omadakwane

izibotho ezingcolile

drowned in toxic dams of booze

 

but i want to drink

from mphahlele’s

well of knowledge

 

tiptoe

behind the immortal lamps

of biko & sankara

 

mandela

my generation doesn’t know

the grave of apartheid

 

my generation knows

a huge economic prison you built

 

buffalo times

buffalo times

buffalo times

buffalo times

 

phala phala times

phala phala times

phala phala times

 

it is a new dawn of social turmoil

on the azanian soil

inkululeko yabelungu

abasichamelayo

 

even court rooms

kak on the face of justice

& the claws of apartheid

breathe between

the colours of the rainbow

 

it is a freedom

of penny sparrow

vicky momberg

& askaris

 

even after ‘94

we are still landless kaffirs

asking for a free education

& a living wage

***

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