Autumn 2010

The rhythmic sound
The rhythmic sound
draws me from words.
At the wall at the bottom of the garden
he is throwing a ball,
bounce-catch-bouncing it.
He is practised and agile,
body moving easily in the pattern.

He pauses,

throws the ball high
into the sky – difficult catch,
easily fumbled.
He tries again
and again
and will
until the rhythm is right,
the ball flies high,
is deftly caught.

I return,
turn the page and begin.
Try again, again
until the rhythm is right,
the words fly,
the meaning wrought.
(from ‘Excision’)

Such little things
Such little things
to wound,
goad me in my denial:
small shoes
barely as long as a finger.

Pain cannot be
sealed neatly away
in these boxes – taped and labelled,
ended with this ceremony of loss.
(from ‘Excision’)

GARY CUMMISKEY

Birthday girl
For her birthday she was
supposed to have had
a hot date, but instead she
tanked up on a bottle of vodka and
leapt into the ocean.

RICHARD DE NOOY

Friends
No time passes when I am with you
No youth is lost, no death waiting
We remain what we once were:
Men of great ambition, lost souls,
Saviours, liars, freaks, gentleboys
We do not know each other
Better now than we did then
That is our secret: to love
But not know because
To know is to presume
And we prefer to meet
Time and time anew
Like the bread we eat
Ever the same slices
But always fresh.

Mathematics
The short drop is never easy, Erik.
You need to give a lot of thought
to vectors, weights and coefficients
which never were my strongest suit.
But you, my friend, took full measure
of the terminal rationale
before you hit the lab and put
your grim equation to the test.
You scored full marks
All went as you predicted
Beam + rope + knot + body = X
But where does gravity fit in? And how?
And so you left us dangling
shrugging, cursing that
we cannot comprehend
such simple mathematics.

ISOBEL DIXON

A Thing of Beauty
Cicadas sandpaper-shaping shadows,
sawing away the dry hot holidays,
welding that day and dozens like it
into one deep, burning sky. This,
before words, is our blue and gold childhood
melded in memory’s magnificent workshop,
enameled in a never-ending half-existent noon.

Bali Talisman
Ho, sly fat frog
cheating at your Pilates drill:
your belly press-up
is a work of art.
Your core strength lies
in obscure jazzy tattooings,
your Sumo gangster stance,
your true amphibious attitude.

Samantha Kipling - Seattle shoreline

FINUALA DOWLING

Doppelganger
In the middle of it all
on a sprung floor
a fellow mingler laughed,
saying I was such a card
I really should meet my other half
and marvel.

Miraculously,
according to the stranger,
my twin was there that night:
in wit and waggish turn of verb
a perfect match. It was uncanny
to find two so alike
at the same party.

We must be introduced —

the wind must whip the flame!
the wave must strike the shore!

”There — at the other end of the room –
can you see which man I mean?”

I didn’t need to look.
I knew it would be you, my own,
and that later, when all our charm was blown
we’d fight in the car on the way home.

To get his attention
I baked pies in phyllo
while he wrote books and plays.
I wanted to write books and plays
but instead I made pies in phyllo.

I laid each sheet down flat
and brushed it lovingly with melted butter.
I laid a damp cloth upon the resting sheets –
the unbuttered ones that I would come back to.

The more I wanted to become a writer
the more I baked flaky pies –
intricate as onionskin,
unfathomable as papyrus.

The parchment contained two messages
that couldn’t be pieced together:
Please appreciate me
Please shout less.

I’ve switched to pen and paper
but my basic method is still the same –

deviousness

For eight years
I tiptoed
I didn’t hear the news
I dressed in the dark
sometimes choosing wrong shoes.

One morning he awoke
to my unmistakeable operating light
to my crackling headlines
and a single, hard-toed shoe.

GUS FERGUSON

The parable of the generous man
I tend to lend the things I like
my CDs, books, my precious bike,

my glasses, tablecloths, my plates;
I press them on my lucky mates.

So what is left, it dawns too late,
are all the things I really hate.

And as we’re judged by what we own
and by the stuff we have on loan

Then here’s my fate, it’s really sad:
my friends look great and I look bad.

The moral drawn from all this sorrow:
It’s bad to lend, it’s good to borrow.
(from ‘Holding Pattern’)

Dorothy Parker
She dipped her pen
In blood, not ink,
She made us laugh,
She made us think.
(from ‘Holding Pattern’)

Synaesthesia Tanka
Blindfolded, he sniffed,
rolled it around his palate,
pondered and pronounced:

‘Charlie Parker – Bird at the
High Hat, nineteen fifty-three’
(from ‘Holding Pattern’)

SARAH FROST

Highveld Afternoon
All that long afternoon it threatened to rain.
My first time in a Shul. No stained glass windows here, or injured Christ.
Just an ordinary hall with scuffed walls, wooden seats.
Ceiling fans whirred from pressed ceilings.

You asked your mother to take me to where the women sit.
I clutched a red book that opened from the wrong side.
A sculpted star of David adorned the metal bars between us.
From a high podium, your nephew intoned his bar mitzvah song.

The rabbi rocked back-and-forth in a far corner,
summoning God from an ancient landscape.
Jerusalem is a bride, and must rise up,
resume her splendour. The mountains and hills shall break forth before her.

I wanted the reassurance of your hand on my leg.
But you were with your father. Your faces creased into the same smile.
For thirty years he has watched your mother from across the room,
as now, we too, look at each other with dark-eyed glances of mutual need.

The children sipped sweet grape juice from small silver cups.
The room was a rain-cloud about to burst.
I held onto the kites of other people’s belonging
let them lift me into the cool air of evening.

Laura Arbuckle - Kite in the mountains

MEGAN HALL

Chernobyl: Elena’s ride
This poem was written after seeing the photos and reading the reportage at www.kiddofspeed.com, which describes the visits of a motorcyclist, Elena, to the restricted zone around Chernobyl. The Zone of Alienation was set up after an explosion at the nuclear power plant in April 1986 rendered a large area of land, including towns and villages, uninhabitable. More images can be seen at http://www.reactor4.be/photos_of_the_forbidden_zone.php.

900 years is long to wait
for the grass to grow clean again.

By then, Piotr and the other 400 souls
who could not bear to leave the dead zone

will long be dead: Piotr dead as he sits in his donkey cart
riding down roads that few now travel;

buried by someone slightly tougher,
in an overgrown garden, where the soil is hot;

soil that sucked in radiation, & held it
like a child sucking cooldrink through a straw.

The cemetery is closed. No one can visit the dead
in this dead zone: the rubble someone buried there,

in true Soviet style, sets the whole graveyard ticking.
The dosimeter doesn’t lie.

The fishing magazines abandoned in the mailbox
are the least of it: Chernobyl birthed its survivors

naked into the world, having taken away the last treasures
– photos, letters – chosen as secret talismans,

before a chemical shower.
All must go, all could kill.

Littering the floor of an abandoned school:
drawings, dolls, small shoes. Surely the children cried

when they missed these? Or were their other losses
too great for these to matter? The only past they could take

was what they carried inside them as memory.
Passports, pictures of ancestors, certificates from school –

these people were detached from their verifiable history,
left wondering if they themselves really existed.

Ships in the harbour. Trains. Row upon row of army trucks.
Fire engines, helicopters, personal cars, office equipment,

the contents of every shop in every street –
all were left behind, all were lost.

I try to imagine this happening here – not so unlikely
with Koeberg squatting on Cape Town’s doorstep like a toad.

I try to imagine the city lost, the harbour closed, every ship left to rot,
every crane left to swing in the south-easter.

Every house and shack empty, every taxi left behind
as if in a wall-to-wall strike.

Leaving my own life, my home, the work of years, the memories in objects.
Leaving with daughter and husband, nothing else.

No more vegetable garden at the Cape, two oceans meeting, Castle,
or cable car moving like a fly up a string.

Cape Town chopped off, circumcised with bush school savagery.

KERRY HAMMERTON

Suffused
I fold the things I want to take:

Sunday morning breakfasts
dissecting the newspaper,
mountain walks, your raised
eyebrow when you were perplexed
or angry, scuba diving in Zanzibar,
the mole behind your knee,
your mouth on my breast,
the smell of your neck,
the way you always yelled:
‘Honey, I’m home’,
the feel of your arm
on my shoulder.

Drifting between the us
of then and the us of now,
I become suffused with
the certainty of who I am.

Gregor Rohrig - Pigeon Flight

PETER HORN

1647 earthquake in Santiago (Kleist)
A young Spaniard, a teacher,
In jail for seducing his student,
Unable to flee through walls and bolts,
Wanting to hang himself,
Heard the bells which were rung
For the execution of his beloved by fire,
When all of a sudden
The greatest part of the town
Fell down with enormous noise,
As if the sky was falling down,
And buried all living beings under its ruins.

While he clung to one pillar
The floor of his jail swayed under his feet
And the walls burst open,
The building seemed to fall towards the street,
But the fall of the house opposite
Formed a vault.
Shaking all over, his hair rising up,
And his knees threatening to fail him,
He slid over the skewed floor to the street
And was saved one moment before
The two buildings finally collapsed.

ANTON KRUEGER

Standing, Sitting, Lying Down
This was written for a First Physical Theatre Aids benefit concert in 2008.
Choreography: Gary Gordon. Featured dancers: Richard Antrobus, Acty Tang, Alan Parker, Tshegofatso Tlholoe. Pictures captured from video by Krueger and Dali

ONE
walking, sitting, sleeping,
living, breathing, dying…
wherever you go, whatever you do
you are either standing or sitting or lying down…

TWO
do you have a body? or does your body have you?
whatever the case may be, one thing is true –
wherever you are, your body is there with you…

THREE
how does it feel to have a strong body or a weak body?
how does it feel to have a young body or an old body?
what does it mean to have a healthy body or a sick body?
how do you feel about other bodies, which are not your body?

Krueger & Dali - Flying

FOUR
wherever you go
whatever you do

your body is either
vertical, horizontal
or folded…

wherever you are
your body is there
whatever you do
your space travels with you

you’re travelling in time
with your space;
travelling in your space suit,
in space time…

Krueger & Dali - Space

FIVE
the body is movement, change,
age is movement, change,
disease is movement, change,
flux and flow, fight and flight –
even the sleeping body is moving…

SIX
can the body turn on itself?
can the body reject itself?
how can the body turn on itself?
who is turning against whom?

can the body be evil?
can the body be holy?
whatever the case may be –
it’s the only body you’ve got…

SEVEN
to be in your body
is like coming home
after a long journey…

to bring your mind
back to your body,
back to the moment…

resting the mind in the body,
respite after restless wanderings
of the mind travelling frantic
into future past and now
arriving here…now…

as the body rests
on the ground…
so mind rests
in the body…

Krueger & Dali - the end

EIGHT
the body is movement, change,
age is movement…

the body which no longer moves…
which no longer dances…
which no longer sleeps…

walking, sleeping, breathing, living, dying
wherever you go, whatever you do
you are either standing or sitting or lying down…

MICHELLE MCGRANE

The Giraffe in the Restaurant
Through long lashes, she eyed us
seated on the green banquette
beneath a sepia photograph
of carcasses hung from hooks
and striped-aproned butchers
wielding cleavers.

She overheard the waiter
reeling off the evening specials,
refilling our glasses with Cabernet Sauvignon,
setting the cast-iron potjie –
the oxtail steeped in its dark gravy –
upon the starched tablecloth.

When we paid the bill,
and left through the swing doors,
her fringed gaze followed us into the square;
she, stuffed and mounted,
tethered with chains
as if she had anywhere to go.

Paper Flowers
When the rain came down
on our wedding day –
and the guests huddled under
the dripping gazebo –

the buttery shrimps
pooled in their glassware
beside the bread baskets
and crumpled napkins.

The champagne turned
to water; the crepe roses
bled into the tablecloths.
Somewhere, a door slammed.

HELEN MOFFETT

Past life
Your short hair needs a cut,
even though it’s thinning now;
it’s the same colour it always was,
aside from a few sparks of grey.
Looking down on you unexpectedly
from a balcony, I see a tender swirl
of scalp emerging at your summit –
and am plunged back onto a bed,
drowning in your hair pouring down
on either side of my face, your
fingers brushing it away
from my mouth.

Your hair was longer than mine then.
It will never come back.
But your fingers are the same.

Big Sky
The most romantic thing I ever did
was in Helena, Montana, home of the Big Sky.
My hosts had a lodger,
a lawyer who wore cowboy boots.
One day he came home
with a muscular new motorbike:
He was eager to show it off, to share
but no one would take a spin with him.
So I said I’d go along for the ride
(forgive me, Ma, they don’t wear helmets here)
I climbed aboard, held on tight
and we were off:
Climbing into the mountains, which
climbed everywhere, but were
dwarfed by the dome of the sky.
Roaring through sweet air,
rushing through green grass, I was
ravished, not by the obvious things –
the throbbing between my legs,
the warm body to which I clung:
But the softness of blond hair
blowing against my mouth.
We stopped eventually:
didn’t start tearing at each other’s clothes,
the view too beautiful, too pressing for that.
Time passed; sunlit, breeze, at ease;
then we headed home, almost sedately.

What we snatched that day
was rare, I know that now:
The gamble of trust paid off.
Our heightened senses,
the arrowing road
led us to a place of
shared peace without regret:
A memory, unrusted by time,
connection under that
flawless, generous sky.

Gregor Rohrig - Kariba Sunset

KOBUS MOOLMAN

Of Dedication to a Greater Good
At the bottom of the ocean he. (By this stage a famous underwater explorer). Found an old wooden chest with 27 543 documents in it. Some were mere scraps. Others a few pages. The bulk though. Were comprised of more than a hundred sheets. All handwritten. All in blue ink. The lost works of an unknown. Overlooked writer. He realised their value immediately. The world had to be made aware of this vast treasure. This justification of a silent. Obscure life. Seizing the papers he began his ascent. But as he rose. Through the dim world of the deep into the light. He noticed that the ink was flowing from the paper. Spiralling off slowly in thin threads as he floated upward. And he realised that by the time he reached the surface hardly any of the precious words would be left. He had no alternative. He returned solemnly to the bottom of the ocean. Making himself comfortable on the black salt. He began the long process of memorizing all 27 543 works.

DASHEN NAICKER

If
If, driving, you leave the N2 as it branches into Umhlali
you will see swaying waves of sugar cane, wire fences rusting,
women at the roadside selling netted avocado pears.

If, passing, you turn into the dusty road with a wooden sign
bronze letters reading ‘Beneva Estate 1930’ you will see
split leaves and brown stalks of sugar cane bowing to the wind.

If, stopping, you step out your car near the concrete wall,
sea wind from Salt Rock at your back, you will see
a road of stone and mud, curving upward, beyond the field.

If, walking, watching for snakes and stones on the damp ground,
you will see an old mango tree, its thin branches
without leaves, a rock and anthill crumbling at its roots.

If, touching, your fingers tracing the brown bark,
the carved initials, you might see the burns left by the ropes
hung over its branches, and a small cross nailed to the tree.

Then, tired, if you decide to sit, back against the grainy base,
hands on cool grass, you won’t see the cuts her axe seared
and the hollows her knees made, falling to the ground.

A.R. REID

Paper weighted
Here is a curious slice of Allie
fallen down behind bookshelves

It must have been cropped
from a photo to fit in the album

Discarded along with people’s feet,
waiter’s torsos, expanses of ceiling and
the long gone other halves of then pairs

ARJA SALAFRANCA

Festive regards
Festive regards before Christmas,
and happy new year just after the year turns,
Have a good weekend on a Friday afternoon,
Hope your week improves, on a blue Monday.
Steak knife Tuesday,
and on Wednesday, halfway through,
we’re nearly there!
And so it goes on, platitudes that mark out
the days, months, years.
You know the drill:
you know to bring wine to a dinner party,
and chocolates, if you insist.
You know to wrap Christmas presents in red,
birthday presents in another colour entirely,
and always, always best wishes.
You say how are you before asking for what you want,
and thank you when a waiter hands you a menu.
You know the alarm must ring in the morning
and that breakfast at 2pm is generally not approved of.
You know it all, don’t you
as you hear the ticking of the clock
you bought cheaply in Spain,
the clock whose alarm no longer works as the
arms toil through the hours
of early morning, two, then three,
still your light remains on, and you know,
don’t you, that it’s not ten or eleven at night,
respectable, normal times, you know, even though
it feels like it is.
You do know, don’t you?

Gregor Rohrig - Sunrise Mazeppa Bay

TANIA VAN SCHALKWYK

Fathomless
There is a fathomless ocean
and it swallows
as it kisses.

In this sea, there are reefs with
edges that fall into steep holes.
You can sit on the coral

dangle your feet into the precipice

let your ankles be nibbled
watch the shades of blue blur,

listen to the man in the sea calling you to come to him–

and you could dive into his cold, hard arms
sink into the endless story of his dark eyes
drink in his salt,

lay down at the bottom of his bed–

or you could wait for a current to take you away,
pull you away from his embrace
pull you out further and further into the open–

floating out, in the deep
arms spread out to the sun,
hair skimming the surface

you may feel peace
may think you have let go
until you sense you are not alone–

the swish and splash of a fin,
the glint of a mouth hungry for you
the tug on your locks, pull on your limbs

recalls you to him, reminds you

of the descent, the day you will be devoured,
of the night you will surrender, the one time
you will stop treading, stop swimming
and allow yourself to drown, fathomless.

CRYSTAL WARREN

Reflections
I see you and me
Reflected in a mirror

Standing together
Deceptively close

If that was a photograph
We would look like a couple

In the mirror world
My arm is around you

While out here
We never touch

DAN WYLIE

Donkey
Palms beneath my feet? In your dreams.
The brand of my destiny is scored across my shoulders
like the rasp of a harness; history cuts into my thin scapulae,
errant flies scourge my ears with their sucking ideologies.
This cart, I drag daily between town and hillside
with its meagre freight of assertions and grass,
the driver’s filthy woollen poverty dragged down
almost over his eyes in the hard sunlight.
All around us only the silence of a country
for too long at war with itself; only rarely
can the grief eke out through the chest, a bray
like the rhythm of a tortured axle-bearing.

When I rest, of the rest, I say nothing,
my unfulfillable tumescence dribbling in the dust.
Look into my eye, its liquid black galaxy.
You cannot evade what it says:
that I want only to be loved.

Mandy Mitchell - Lone Cloud (Namib)

FIONA ZERBST

Circles
There are places you choke on heat.
Where rock, stripped of its fat,
is muscle used up;
where sheep lie flat,
like drawstring bags in the sand.

You have to move on, to go;
find water, shreddings of meat.
Light or a house on a smudged hill
where people,
asleep on their feet, found simple refuge.

You had it, once.
A hand that opened, let go,
because you were older, old enough
to explore those charred remains
of the circles: Inferno.

One afternoon
In certain places,
windowsill silence.

Poplar-thin longing
among slight shifts
in a leaf-caught breeze.

Naked vacancy
in a room
where helpless objects
open and open
light-caught selves

to the future.

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Incwadi

A Journal of South African poetry and photography

Autumn 2010

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