Poem for South African Women

by June Jordan

Commemoration of the 40,000 women and children who,

August 9, 1956, presented themselves in bodily protest against

the “dompass” in the capital of apartheid. Presented at The

United Nations, August 9, 1978.

Our own shadows disappear as the feet of thousands

by the tens of thousands pound the fallow land

into new dust that

rising like a marvelous pollen will be

fertile

even as the first woman whispering

imagination to the trees around her made

for righteous fruit

from such deliberate defense of life

as no other still

will claim inferior to any other safety

in the world

Xenophobia: call to action

by Nomboniso Gasa, Loudrastress, 2008 (There is a review of Gasa's edited book, Women in South African History, by Sokari Ekine, here.)

When crimes begin to pile up they become invisible.
When sufferings become unendurable the cries no are no longer heard.
The cries too, too, fall like rain summer – Bertolt Brecht

This is an email I have dreaded writing for days but whose time has come nevertheless. There can be no doubt that the violence that is erupting in our country has reached levels that compel us to respond in ways that are driven by clarity of thought, moral conviction and a clear refusal to allow our hard worn freedom to be taken by criminals- irrespective of the masquerade they use.