Skip to main content

Blood Stains On The Pavement


Blood stains on the pavement
The footprints of an extinguishing life force

Squalor, death and rust
They care not for us

Gunshots, disembodied screams
And the ever-present swan song of police sirens

Little kids play on concrete streets
No place to house innocence when home possesses no safety,
Nor does it offer security

In the men we can never trust, devoid of wisdom and humility   
Masculinity as fragile as a wine glass

We once wore deviance as the voice of the silenced
Now we neatly tuck it away together with all the agency of our womanhood

We weave street lights like moths to flame
My brothers forget us
My sisters allow it
And the children cannot help but witness it

They placate our existence with the amnesia we find at the bottom of a bottle
They wait like vultures

They poison us with unsolicited prescriptions,
When only they carry the sickness

Young boys raise hands and fists
For a cause rooted only in violence

We die, cry and subscribe to the brutality
The black man has lost his humanity

Because to intervene and interrogate is the seal to a dying fate
Hate, venom, the thickened slime and grime of the misplaced

Comments

  1. simthembileNovember 13, 2018 at 12:20 AM

    damn, your writing is personified, it feels as you writing of your experiences, it sounds like a shout(Scream) for help and now its deeper not because of tirey because of disappointment.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Solam MacatshaNovember 13, 2018 at 2:34 AM

    It is a reflection of my time spent here in Joburg CBD. It speaks to all the hate and harassment we as women suffer from.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Do you remember

Do you remember when voices from the past called me to your side Do you remember when both our heartbeats were the toughest to hide Do you remember when you called me a gift because to you time had never been too kind Do you remember when you said my stubbornness was my strength and not a weakness Do you remember the holes we patched over like a seasoned seamstress Do you remember when you touched me and it felt so good I couldn't imagine how I had existed with so much less Do you remember when we got home and all you wanted to see was my body underneath that dress Do you remember when you whispered love and chuckled like you were new to this Do you remember when our eyes met and it was as natural as coming up for a kiss Do you remember when you made me laugh until my belly was sore Do you remember when you promised you wanted to give me all that and more Do you remember when the cancer started to grow Do you remember when we started fighting and we didn't even know...
2 comments
Read more

Still too young

Infinite curiosity and wonder Holding up a woolen crown Weaved with a thread of certainty Kissing both the heavens and the earth Nestling the subtle nectar of unconditional love Tentatively peering past the constraints re-imagined by men The dirt and the musk veiled by bright lights Passively they walk past monuments and metaphors Little to no regard for the rotten underbelly The stench of hopes lost, dreams discarded -           And complacency accepted as a norm Ill fitted realities we slide into Like slick robes we put them on Forsaking a most sacred calling While we abide a most trivial and misguided mental oppression Somehow convinced that this is the best we can offer Prison or a coffin… Dying before we are dead- a routine we practice too often The shoes we cannot fill are too grand A history we cannot placate Because what we are is the change they died for Unsatisfied, but we remain...
2 comments
Read more