(Homage to the Kwanza River
" Water mother " of Angola)
Largest and only Angolan
Art thou, O majestic Kwanza!
In the central highlands
We see thee rise in Mumbué
And 960 kilometers of undoubted majesty
To the north and west
Since the municipality of Chitembo, in Bié
Stretch out on the big curve design
Before the hug, so sweet, so strong
You give to the salt of the Atlantic
Largest and only Angolan
Art thou, O majestic kwanza!
With an enviable basin
For two hundred and fifty
Kilometers, you are navigable
From the mouth to the Dondo
Where the dams of Cambambe and Capanda
Render yourself patriotic reverence
By the megawatts of power
Largest and only Angolan
Art thou, O majestic Kwanza!
As well as to the national currency unit
In the two provinces, thy name this also:
At its northern margin, Kwanza Norte
And Kwanza Sul, on the opposite bank, equally
They pay more than deserved tribute
Throughout the Oxford countryside,
Ubiquitous. You cannot miss
That chimney or those cooling towers,
Dubbed “cloud machines” by local kids.
Fuelled by coal, this power station,
Condemned to death by Brussels Greens.
“Marmite” to a generation –
A love or hate industrial scene.
Iconic as the “dreaming spires”,
That is, if you ignore the wires
That droop from those gigantic towers,
Delivering to the nation, Power –
Two thousand megawatts, in fact.
The power to light two million homes
For two score years. The final act :
Disconnection. Demolition.
They’ll soon be gone – blown up, knocked down,
We’ll never see its like again;
Just memories now in Didcot town,
But do not mourn : less acid rain.
The intro on the disc menu repeats its edited reel;
sometimes, it skips in the slot, pixellating the flat screen,
the stars’ faces ripping into confetti squares.
She asks you to turn down the volume;
you reach a hand across her stomach to click the remote.
The television blanks in a shock of popping sound.
She rolls over to face you in the silence,
the darkness of the room folding around her.
You feel more naked without the speakers blaring over your head
than you do with your bare skin on hers beneath the sheets.
She has already fallen asleep, her arms heavy over your waist,
and you wonder how well you would sleep beneath pine trees and the man in the moon.
You close your eyes, bend your face forward,
and your noses touch – she shifts, pulls you in tighter.
That touch – and bright colors explode over your closed eyes,
more beautiful than high-definition cable, more radiant than megawatts.
Her cell phone rings, the vibrations rattling the coffee table.
You open your eyes and she rubs her fingers down your back; you shiver.
She kisses you, hard, as the phone rings itself into silence.