If birds of a feather flock together
altho' it's a fact
how do opposites
like you and I attract?
North and south two similar poles
on opposing sides of the street
repel and push each other away
and so the twain shall never meet.
If there's a magnetic attraction
between you and me
then opposite poles be we
and as I recall you're not repellent at all
in truth quite the magnetic personality.
Columbia South America
So stunning, this inviting street seemed!
With reptilian powers, it crawled into my
imaginative dreams.
I created the people who were living there.
Sipping their dark, magical, delicious Colombian coffee on sun-cooked chairs.
The mens’ sparkling, hypnotic eyes were
far, far, beyond any sensual compare!
I adore going to bed and closing my eyes…
~~If my heart has the courage to dare!~
9/22/2025
[Poet’s Note : this is a wry autobiographical memory written in traditional pirouette verse viz. 2 quintains, line 5 & 6 repeat, which is the toe turnaround. I wanted to write a narrative of a weird syncopated vignette, when I was knitting a pink mohair jersey at the time of my imprisonment. I reduced the narrative to a pirouette. When in prison, one of my interrogators was knitting the EXACT jersey in the exact colour & exact wool ! ie. in the final analysis, (in retrospect) everything in human life can be reduced to a pirouette, a turn-around dance ! ]
knitting a pink jersey
mohair with cables fine
to process flying thoughts
political activist
south africa turmoiled
south africa turmoiled
security police
came with casspirs and cuffs
interrogation chamber
police knit jersey pink
~~~~~~~~~
I am Rainbow
seven colours merged to flowing
glow in Dark Nights of the Soul
landed in a country nicknamed
the “Rainbow Nation” untamed
my mission to transform, transmute
colours covered in dust and rust
with rain we gain, attain without shame
sublime freedom for Self and fellow
with not much bellow never shallow
arcs of colours we witness together
comradeship our survival dope to cope
heliocentric symbols unified we hope
regard one another with approval and respect
as we watch rainbows high-low, know neglect
through struggling pain red became orange
orange yellow, yellow to green to blue then
indigo to white sprinkled with fight, onto light
arcs across sunny skies, sunflowers, koppies
such radiant patterns flood our mixed-up blood !
I no longer praise it, no I don’t,
I no longer call it, the Nation’s pride,
Nor do I raise it anymore, it lost value.
No, it doesn’t hold its meaning anymore.
Unity became just a word, in political rhetoric,
The thread of ubuntu isn’t strong enough to-
Hold together the colors, my flag needs sewing,
Gold, green, blue, black and white no longer wave.
The rainbow isn’t a rainbow in the absence of one color,
Bishop, for now I fold and put away your dream,
No, I will not burn it, for I still believe in the dream,
The rainbow nation is a phoenix t’will rise again and wave the colors.
Perhaps one day, the flag will mend,
And the thread of unity will unite the flag
The colors will wave, vibrant and bright,
Just like Bishop D. Tutu envisioned it.
Until then, I will hold on to the hope,
That ubuntu spirit will kick the coffin open,
The rainbow’s promise will be fulfilled,
Then that will be when I wave the flag again.
No glamour here in the South Bay
where function and industry reign
just an occasional seagull is seen
gliding over the steel grid power lines.
The daily westerly winds whistle
swaying a small fleet of sailboats
buoys bob along a mariner’s course
as he navigates the currents.
Ships of all shapes and sizes
quietly line the edges of the bay
docked or moored in place
patiently waiting their turn at sea.
An unearthly silence lingers
around the salt flats that arise
staking their claim at the south shore
a monument to the “bitter end”.
It is peaceful here…without pretense
where the hum of traffic is heard
endlessly moving along an offramp
while the random seagull flies above.
Nestled among the shining peaks
of flashing glass and girded steel,
gilded mansions enjoyed by sheiks;
who queue for nearby Ferris wheel;
near Parliament’s Gothic seat,
Shakespeare’s Elizabethan Globe,
It sits, grey, brutal, pure concrete
shameless without a cladded robe.
It’s naked beauty clads itself
around creativeness within.
I am it shouts, I am myself
without a falsifying skin.
With jutting angles, edges hard,
it’s beauty is more honest than
the Pickle, Telephone, or Shard
I will forever be a fan.
wings catch the wind's plea,
ancient calls across the miles,
new lands greet the sun.
They bore the winds of time
as they rose from arid lands.
They sun poked past one peak
while my work crew waited
to move to another place on the highway,
and we knew the day would fade.
We knew
highways must always be mended
and the same with our lives.
We spoke in hushed voices
among these hills
made when the earth shifted.
Somewhere beyond rested
a blanket of stars.
We let traffic pass
and two of us held stop/slow signs
and they would stand at the ends
of the work zone.
Along the highway was a casino
and a bar. If we listened closely
we could hear a breeze tell a story
of the old west. Some patrons
gambled their fortunes every day
and they lived in shadows
of pioneers who gave their lives
for this land.
Every time something was lost
it would be time to start again.
One man I stopped said
that it rarely rained but when it did
it stormed.
To this day I envision him
when his house would shake to the sound of thunder
nestled under a deep cover of darkness.
It was a way of life to him.
Wear something nice
Not to fancy
Check the heels
On those shoes
Tonight I feel like
dancing
This is a lovers
Interlude
Iwe feel in love in
Ole Dell Rio
Under a Strawberry
Moon
It ain't that complicated
It's our destiny
I assume
She's such a sophisticated
Lady
Darling can I hold your
Hand
It's a privilege to say
Your my lady
I'm so proud to
be your man
Now and then I would
Answer
If only you would ask
I'd kiss you now
It neither chore or task
We feel in love
In Ole Dell Rio
Put a flower in
Her hair
She is such a sexy woman
I could watch and stare
What truly is power
Is it control or the silence that follows it?
Is it born from bullets and broken promises
Or from the love we dismiss as weakness?
Can power ever be shared
like bread split between hungry Sudanese hands
as if leadership were a meal
the poor can taste in equal halves?
Or is power what poisons the soil
the reason Sudanese children sleep in graves
instead of schools
the reason Sudanese mothers run carrying loss?
Power has become a cruel currency
bought with lives and traded in blood.
But perhaps the truth is this
power without love is nothing but war.
they said justice
but meant
just us
and here I sit—
a roach in a cage of light,
the hum of the air thick
with bleach and lies.
my skin
was the evidence.
my eyes—guilty.
no rich man ever came
this far south
to die
in a room this cold.
I write with broken pencils
and dream of rain,
the kind that doesn't stop.
Polar bear at the north pole,
floating on a lone ice floe,
thinks to himself,
'What happened to my world,
where did all the ice go?'
If to the south pole he did depart,
penguins to compare,
would he then be,
a well-traveled
bipolar bear?
the warmth in the eyes
is how the mountain outlines
left in me, unspoken
by sunsets
by the ghosts of what never happened
the echoes measured the distance
still not having found a form, they wander
just like you and me
through our valleys
the saddened silence in me
I'll enshrine as an aftertaste
of the grape sun
look at who you are now, sweetheart
desperately enfolding me
with the warmth of the land of the Upper Rhine
Into me
When will they see
I shall let myself be
Inertwine in revolution
Searching for peace
Why has it become so hard
Almost 50 years to the day
Alone I sit
Ponder it all
I need it to end
This insecurity
No longer a child
Don't want to be an adult
Time is slipping away
Running out of life
Will I be this way for all my days
Where is the courage to be seen
Hidden away forgotten
Indulged in unspeakable abuses
Welcoming the lies
Avoiding all truths
I am the example
The intuition of what not to be
Here I stare back at me
With so much discus
I don't think six feet deep will keep it secure
They all will call me by name
The demons will run fear
The victims will lie
It will be the carnage I need
To remember all that was left of me before
It all went south.
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