Welcome to k!7, where kushinda! introduces Tsepo Gumbi, a young poet and artist from Sharpeville, one of the most historically significant places in South Africa. He is in his own words 'a shy ordinary fellow who prefers his own space and enjoys the world of creative arts.' He is currently working towards completing his first anthology of poems, which he has also illustrated. Below I have chosen two of Tsepo's poems with their accompanying illustrations. I am struck first by the love in his words and the great empathy for women, then by the powerful resolve to live in joy and hope - might 'Rock Strong' and 'The Hope In Her Child's Dreams' be metaphors for South Africa ? I don't know, I have yet to visit Tsepo's homeland, I will let you decide, but I can not think of better wishes than joy, hope and love to you all this Christmas.
the hope in her child’s dreams
she sinks deep into emotions of despair
her fainting hope fading with invisible air
her heart grieves as she perceives
she bleeds her tears into an empty bowl
she cries her prayers to an open sky
a deaf god
her pleasure is soaked in a river of pain
her eyes, her shame
covered with sympathetic blankets of public pity
she weaves her comfort fabric with fantasy threads
she hangs her child’s dreams on a thin swing string
yet she hopes for a good life for this child
she takes refuge under a refuse bag
poverty greets her good morning with yellow teeth smile
each day she has to survive
hunger and starvation
but when the sun declines his light
the night rises and falls on the same poverty plight
and when tomorrow dawns
with yellow teeth smile
she has drowned even deeper into a misery tank
she cries her prayers to the open sky of a deaf god
for grace, but again the widow weeps in vain
the window of heaven’s door is closed
she is slowly swallowed by a swarm of gloom clouds
but she never ever abandons the hope in her child's dreams
she never did abandon the child and his crazy dreams
am her child
and the words of this poem are the dreams of my hope
the hope in her child’s dreams
the burden she never abandoned
i am the hope in her eyes’ dreams
rock strong
women are rock strong
you strike a woman
you knock a hard rock
rocks never feel pain
rocks cannot cry
rocks wont die
women are rocks!
their brittle bodies are unbreakable
when love hurts
your heart hates
when your heart operates on anger
you can easily murder
when you love someone
you wont let them hurt you
if love can make you weep
what can stop it to make you bleed
victim of romantic violence
domestic silence destroys you
bruises don’t make a lady look pretty
break loose!
a woman’s bruised face is like
a butterfly with broken wings
a beautiful rose planted in mud
a bee with rotten honey
Poetry and pictures copyright of Tsepo Gumbi 2009
kushinda!
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