This Place

By Philani Tyson Nombika, South Africa:

I have been to places I cannot speak art as how it feels,

Words don’t escape me but the mere nature of the place blanks out Art

There are four roomed houses that we call our homes that are in the shapes of heart

Music escapes me in the place and conversation feel void of spoken word but words are in communication all day..

The slice of a tongue is there but its shredded

The might of a pen is a distant everyday battle raged but never won

The slash of a sword screams and lays on hopeful hills undisturbed

In busy corners like a street poet on a soap box chanting “the world is ending”

I’ve been born in a place been dying everyday living in a rehearsed haze

I live in a place like this and its deadly.

This place calls to me in hills I bury myself from rivers I’ve crossed

This place needs me and I’m always there

No one ever lives in this place

No one lives this place

But we echo as life everyday, we move about careless of perish which is imminent

This place I find hope stabbed in a street corner bleeding gasping for air

And everyone is suspect

Let them die where they lived the most

The place they have died in the most

The place they call home

Heartless out of this place but we have tasted freedom

And we want to leave this place.