Immigrant daughter
For Anael
Whose daughter am I
in this clamorous land
this bewildered nation of alien hope
of barriers and walls
and seditious intention
I am a daughter of the warm African earth
I am a daughter of the wind in the grasses
Whose daughter am I
in this promised land
this self-absorbed nation of chosen people
of grieving and guns
and ancient superstition
I am a daughter of the Indian Ocean
I am a daughter of the traveling sand
I am a daughter
an absent daughter
I am a daughter
Of Mandela’s land
Whose daughter am I
under moon and sun
whose daughter am I on this ancient road
I am a daughter
I am a daughter
I am a daughter of this stern old globe
Go Up
Crossing the road
For Edna
Sometimes I stand at the side of the road
and wait to cross. And then I wait some more.
As the cars stream by, I wonder
whether to do my Queen Victoria thing,
you know, the bit where I stalk into the road,
one hand held up, palm open,
and the long line of cars
from the main road into the suburb
startle to a halt as I, palm up,
march majestically before them.
Today, as I stood pensively waiting
at the side of the road -
I hadn’t yet got to the cardinal question
of my Queen Victoria thing -
a drop-dead gorgeous young creature
with the gentlest curve of belly –
very short blouse, you see -
(an image of my step father saying – not enough material eh?) -
Well, up she came and stood beside me and
instantly, as naturally as the fashions change,
that long line of cars
from the main road into the suburb
swept cheerfully to a halt.
Which just goes to show
that women with generous,
passion comfortable bodies
and fifty seven years of being
are simply invisible.
- Although, if you ask me,
the sight of a flowing haired
fifty seven year old woman
in a pink cotton Indian dress and a straw hat
doing her Queen Victoria thing
is also worth a little something -
Go Up
Bon Appétit
When this little room is tucked away into the evening
the window closed behind long
yellow-cotton curtains
I look through the door to the living room
- it's a small apartment -
where a deserted concrete building fills the window.
From that room I can see
the grey sky in the evening or
the blue sky in the morning.
But, right now,
grey light spreads its livery across IsraelPalestine
where the bombs fall
and the rockets rise
and a baby is killed in the crossfire.
So tell me, my hearties,
after the signal
after the rocket
after the bomb -
It isn't about Jews and Palestinians anymore, is it,
- not so long ago it wasn't about Bosnia and Sarajevo -
but hey,
who gives a shit, I am just
one of the people
who wait beneath the bomb or the rocket
who take the bus that will explode
who ride the taxi with a man marked by the IDF - that most moral
army -
someone going home to a newborn
when the soldier fires,
when the café blows up.
Listen to me, look at me,
you who will never recognize me at the polls,
I see you
taking that call
giving that signal
making that plan
- before going home to dinner -
Why, you won't even know I'm gone
because you don't even know I'm here. Whatever.
And if I am unfair, well,
I guess you can always do something about it,
about the ineffable notion of peace.
In the meantime,
Bon Appétit.
Go Up
Copyrights
@ Noel Canin
|
The Jacaranda Trees
For Myrtle and her daughters
I push him in his wheelchair
down past the 48 bus,
through the gas station
and up beneath the Jacarandas
to the park. He murmurs, this sweet boy,
and I stroke the top of his head.
In the capital of my
childhood country,
Jacarandas still stain the streets purple.
Today’s blooms untainted by the old terror
conceived and legislated within the golden brick
embrace of the Union Buildings. Remember?
The man in the suit and polished shoes,
running,
the policemen in their uniforms
and black boots,
grinning?
They chased him because he was black
because he was a black man wearing a suit,
they fired at him
because he was a black man
on his way.
The grey faced man asleep on the divan
in our dining room?
Who wasn’t there the next day
and whom my mother never mentioned again
and years later said she didn’t remember
when I asked.
My aunt and uncle, when they came
looking for explosives at two or four
or five in the morning,
and my uncle who let them in
stark naked
and said yes
he always kept explosives under
his four year-old daughter’s bed
and God help them if they woke her
and they could fetch their own bloody ladder
if they wanted to climb up into the roof.
The young black Jazz musician who leaped
from the guest room window
when they came to make sure nothing
subversive
was going on in the middle of the
sleepdead night, goddamn left wing Jews,
and who came back to practice on the piano
as if nothing had happened
that would not happen again and again
and again.
I push him in his wheelchair
down past the 48 bus,
through the gas station
and up beneath the Jacarandas
to the park.
And the blooms still redolent with
dread and dreams
night after night
shapeless hordes
running gaining grasping
terror slashed away
with a shriek
at first light.
Through the sweat of childhood
the gracious purple of the
swaying Jacaranda trees.
Go Up
The Accordian
Two veined brown hands
under two chafed black straps,
hands drawing out and pressing in,
parchment stretching to the
sounds of an alien childhood,
in his eyes the smile of his grandfather
watching his grandmother dance,
her black dress billowing in the
dry veld wind and her laugh
snatched to the grasses sighing,
If the hands did not choose
to slip beneath those straps,
open wide the muscular old arms,
no power on earth could
roll out that sound.
Go Up
Copyrights
@ Noel Canin
|
