A Look Around

 

 

 

It has been holidays and our town is strangely quit, at least it is quit where we live. It seems that everybody moved to the beach, so we prefer to stay at home or walk in the vicinity. Now that all the presents are delivered, we start to think about goodbyes and new arrivals.

 

When I cross this town by car, I confess that I feel shocked with poverty and dirty on the streets.  There are things really revolting like the selling of big chunks of meat on a busy and filth corner, with flies everywhere, people and cars passing by. I must say that I have to turn my face away for not upsetting my stomach.

 

But in general, over the last years I developed the capacity of looking around with tolerance, kindness and even humor. Who would guess, for instance, how skilful poverty is? It is enough to see what people can do to maintain things working. When I saw some photos of improvised chairs used by security workers called guardas, I laughed like a possessed. I know perfectly well that the situation is real and common but to see it pictured it is almost like a form of art, a statement or a vision. I had to react! The fact that I laughed doesn’t mean that I find poverty funny. For sure I don’t. I laughed for the humor, for the pleasure of the photographer who discovered the chairs and took the pictures, and why not say the pleasure of the people enjoying a daily seat obtained with such “effort and ability”.

 

Because of these extreme unusual situations that seem to happen when less expected, I concluded that I always had to carry a camera with me but this time of the year it is wiser to leave it behind. Due to this decision, I have lost a couple of “good” shots such as the “Pink Floyd I”, a public transport mini bus called chapa. Now I can say – but I can’t show it – that there are two Pink Floyd busy chapas crossing this town.

 

I have lost another unforgettable picture: a drunken man, seating at a barraca (street bar), inclining towards a bazooka (2 liter beer bottle), and wearing an orange and worn out T-shirt with these words on the back: fitness consultant!

Farewell

                                                                       

O beloved farewell…

Hold these leaping dreams of fire

With the skeletal hands of death

So that when hungry night encroaches

You defy her stubborn intrigues.

 

Do not look to where we turn and seethe

We pale humanity, like worms

(The ululations might bind you to our grief)

Whose feet carry the duty of life.

 

Farewell beloved

Even the hush that haunts the afternoon

Will sing the ding-dong drum of your ultimate joy

Where we sit by the fireside tossing the memories

Making the parts fit into each day complete;

Yet knowing ours is a return of emptiness

 

Farewell, yewu… ye.

 

         Mazisi Kunene (South Africa)

Fantasy…

                                                                                        

I climbed towards you on a ray of moonlight

that filtered through a hole in my straw-thatched house

When I had reached the smiling arch of your mouth among

   the stars

you came to me

open under the sea of your body the heaving wave under

   my body

my heart beating to the rhythm of yours moving to the

   rhythm of your tribe the people of the mountain;

your serpent form writhing beneath mine

I sucked your cobra’s poison from your broken lips

And my fever mounted like a sickness.

 

        Boundzeki-Dongala (Congo-Kinshasa)

Come away

 

 

Come away, my love, from streets

Where unkind eyes divide,

And shop windows reflect our difference.

In the shelter of my faithful room rest

 

There, safe from opinions, being behind

Myself, I can see only you;

And in my dark eyes your grey

Will dissolve.

                       The candlelight throws

Two dark shadows on the wall

Which merge into one as I close beside you.

 

When at last the lights are out,

And I feel your hand on mine,

Two human breaths join in one,

And the piano weaves

Its unchallenged harmony.

 

          Joseph Kariuki (Kenya)

Lonely

                                            

It gets awfully lonely

Lonely

Like screaming

Screaming lonely

Screaming down dream alley

Screaming of blues, like none can hear

But you hear me clear and loud

Echoing loud

Like it’s for you I scream.

 

I talk to myself when I write

Shout and scream to myself

Then to myself

Scream and shout

Shouting a prayer

Screaming noises

Knowing this way I tell

The world about still lives

Even maybe

Just to scream and shout

 

Is it I lack the musician’s contact

direct?

Or, is it true, the writer

creates

(except the trinity with God, the machine and he)

incestuous silhouettes

to each other scream and shout,

to me shout and scream

pry and mate,

inbred deformities of loneliness.

 

             Bloke Modisane (South Africa)

Escape

                             

Like

a stiffed-necked

flower

drooping

as dawn

crawls

out of night,

your frail

wings

left

a shudder

in the sand

of dunes on my deserted

beach

 

         William Syad (Somalia)

Exile

 

 

                                                                 

In silence                                                   

The overloaded canoe leaves our shores

 

But who are these soldiers in camouflage,

These clouds going to rain in foreign lands?

 

The night is loosing its treasures

The future seems a myth

Wraped on a loom worked by lazy hands.

 

But perhaps all is not without some good for us

As from the door of a shack a thousand miles away

The scaly hand of a child takes in greeting

The long and skinny fingers of the rain.

 

                      Mbella Dipoko (Cameroons)

African Thunderstorm

                                                        

From the west                                                                                                     

Clouds come hurrying with the wind

Turning

Sharply

Here and there

Like a plague of locusts

Whirling

Tossing up things on its tail

Like a madman chasing nothing.

 

Pregnant clouds

Ride stately on its back

Gathering to perch on hills

Like dark sinister wings;

The wind whistles by

And trees bend to let it pass.

 

In the village

Screams of delighted children

Toss and turn

In the din of whirling wind,

Women –

Babies clinging on their backs –

Dart about

In and out

Madly

The wind whistles by

Whilst trees bend to let it pass.

 

Clothes wave like tattered flags

Flying off

To expose dangling breasts

As jiggered blinding flashes

Rumble, tremble, and crack

Amidst the smell of fired smoke

And the pelting march of the storm. 

             David Rubadiri (Malawi)

Sunsets 2

 

 

 

Do I have the right words to describe last Monday sunset at Maputo beach? I doubt, but I have to try.

 

After 5pm Maputo beach is like a busy working fellow showing signs of a needed rest. Families and holiday children are leaving for their homes, and we can see large stretches of beach without a single soul.

 

We have to pick different places everyday and adopt a few precautions, because we were told that the beach is not a safe place to be. We start to run or walk, depending on our dog mood. Occasionally we cross with other people who also enjoy walking on the beach. At a far corner there is still a group of five kids playing with the sand. Under a palm tree, a romantic couple is so close that at a distance they look like a single person. They talk on each other ears and laugh from time to time. What could they be whispering? Promises of eternal love? Games of seduction to play later on?

 

The moment that we decide that it is enough of walking and the right time to go, the beach metamorphoses itself as if it doesn’t want to be left alone under the approaching shadows of the night.

 

Looking around, I can’t believe it! The air is still and at the same time fresh, perfect it is the word. The sea is calm, rocking us in the quit cadence of the breaking waves. Cute little fishing boats are solitary spread along the extensive blue, in an act of surrender and abandon that touches our senses.

 

And then the sky! From the spot where the sun is slowly preparing its magical daily disappearing number, it is possible to see the most exciting array of shades and shapes. I have conscience that I am pointing and talking about everything, but now that I write I just can resume the experience by telling that moments like these are rare.

 

If you wonder what is Seabell doing besides watching sunsets, she is now in the third afternoon of wrapping Christmas presents. This year she has prepared quite an amount of beach baskets with presents inside, one for each family that we know. Ours are at the fireplace, of course without the fire or we would steam! The job is almost done and on time!

 

Our summer Christmas will be at home, this time without JP that only returns at the end of January. After, we will be on “house duty”, because TD will go to Ponta do Ouro and Andy to Inhambane, from where they will return already in 2007. We expect another Réveillon like 2005/6, with champagne and strawberries on the beach or at the club, just for an hour or so. Next days I will post African poems as a gift to seven people that are far away from Seabell, wishing them a nice “family party” and a good “walk” through 2007. The fun of it will be to guess which one is for each seven of them.

Thoth

 

Our little dog Thoth arrived a month ago during the night, after a long wait due to the required licenses to cross the border. We regret such delay, because during the first months of its existence the dog could have received a better care under our supervision.

 

The previous dogs that we owned come to our house with 30 to 45 days and they grew really strong and big. This one has pedigree, looks, cleverness, but arrived with signs of underdevelopment and skin problems. The breeders defend a “diet” and claim that the little dog can’t eat more than once a day, what goes against all that I know about the first year of life. In fact, during the first weeks with us, the dog showed difficulty in eating 2 or 3 meals a day, but that was before I remember the words “vitamins” and “walks”.

 

The mother of our dog is English and the father is South African. The small dog has five months now and is still growing. It has a wonderful personality: playful, sucker for cuddling, extraordinary hunter… Thoth conquered my affect with a couple of things: for one chewing Paul’s knees and above all walking with a red rubber toy at one corner of its month and from time to time pressing it to make it squeak.

 

When we take him for a walk, Thoth usually makes scenes after a short while. Yesterday I had to insist to take him for a walk on the beach, because I had my suspicions… Once there, Thoth went crazy with contentment and I had to run with him, despite my muscle condition. Paul had to admit my point: Thoth only likes to walk on the beach. Yep! Seabell has got a seadog!