Nevertheless, in these uncomfortable sermons, not all is bleak: my love lives/I hope survives the hatred that is sacred.
Lines for Vincent
they pulled out his teeth
with a pair of pliers before he died
wrenched out his nails
'cos they wanted his manhood denied
they cut off his genitals
with a butcher-knife
while he bled they skinned him
& let the blood flow with the wind
i got the full blow of the message
in the red rage of a storm
whipping hard at the back of my neck of shame
& still the shack of memory rattles its bones
let's put it in perspective
no one i know saw vincent's corpse
& the condolences were dry cleaned
by a military-man who lived
for the struggle to be human
yes the man in command made a demand
for his pounds of blood & flesh
we buried an empty coffin to symbolise
they say a jackal carried away his skull
was found choked on the bullet lodged in the brain
legend would have it
they waved his head in the air
& the bones would have made a throne
for the president
they mutilated & sodomized his dead body
vincent was my cousin killed by bravery
& a nation's homicidal glory
i showed him my first pubic hairs
& in the season of my confusion
he pointed out the path & how to walk it
but took a knock on the shock of mortality's discovery
on his feet with fog for a blanket
crept thru smog of a cannon's fart blast
to die in komatipoort
site of a seal on the settlement of deathexcrement
justice took a hit in the killing fields
vincent on the hill of scarlet
with the chill wrapped around him
it was a whirlstorm within
tucked under a blanket of fear
as murder's recognition grew
& still the wind of torment blew
at night i drown in sweat
with the sight of a death-grin
with a gun aimed at my brains
& they call that figment
of a fevered imagination
& still
i see the made up faces on the news
tremble as i watch them tuck into luncheon
in limousine whip thru function after
& want to get their views
on why lives were compromised
but my questions are lobotomised
it's no use
stirring the grail of revolution
when all it can yield
is a landful of maggots in convulsions
the mother couldn't stop shaking her head
so they certified her mad
& locked her inside her solitude
the bomb bullet blade poison
or just silence
can ease the itching sore in my mind
as my tongue twitches
i know i might encounter the death
of speech
but it's said memory is a long road
made worse by the heavy load
of violence
