Proteas don’t fear fire,
dead fish still blink here
and I drink Buchu on an empty stomach
She told me the smaller shark seemed harmless
but it grinned at her and told her she won’t make it out alive it grinned though
and since proteas don’t fear fire she will continue to blink
He fears words but continue to squeeze all the lavender bushes in the garden
I think Coloured men only cry in church
We play hide and seek in the twilight,
but the wooden doors have moving faces
and as you run through freshly cut grass
the shadows briefly stroke thin long arms down your sides
proteas don’t fear fire though
He said the waters only call the children that they love the most,
but I am tired of salt water in my lungs
She said she loved me, but I fear seeing her staring at me with milky white cowry eyes
and I wildly clap and scream
She reminds me that the bees moved in that late summer
while she was calling out for answers
I think of all the types of proteas
and how they seem to sleep when planted by human hands
He said in order for a spring to live it must have an uitloop, anders loop dit weg
we dug that day and we stood knee-deep
I don’t know about springs,
but I know about echoes
I know about voices and I know about warnings
He said the trees in the garden have gone deaf, but we can prune them
I think about all the clear rivers crisscrossing
while a chorus rose from underneath the wheat fields and sang and sang
I wonder why someone can be gone, but also not gone-gone
and stare at the living wearing flower patterned dresses with frayed white collars
She said I never learned to smile,
but smiling hurts my face and proteas do not fear fire
She said there is dirt and then there is real dirt,
she said she saw her friend relaxing in the morning sun,
but making sense of it all
she said her friend was violated outside amongst the houses that night
and wasn’t resting in the sun,
she said women are being thrown from cliffs
I tried to see,
but I must be a bird because my eyes fly over fences and wires and signs
and small-minded men
and men in small offices
and small men in small offices in small towns,
that say that they shoot on sight and ‘oortreders sal vervolg word,
so I must be a bird
I forgot about the proteas but they must still burn and the fires are still coming,
Now I must find the right gods to beg for rain,
but we have rain gods and rain gods and rain gods
and sometimes they are fickle spirits living in watering holes dug by grandparents –
grandparents just as fickle,
because they ride the wind and slam doors and cause mayhem with all the glassware
He said the judge allowed the man to say that the Brown man was a hare
and that’s why he drove over him
they all talk about skin setting you free
she said you can still hear the screams of the people dropped in the secret crocodile reservoir
She said slaves were happy,
because she heard them sing while they worked her fathers’ lands
she said it’s a shame I don’t know my history,
because the queen came to town
She said all the half-breed girls had to be hidden at night
She said wake up and water all these dead women
She said move your feet
She said she was taught history in school today
he got out of bed and said that we know nothing
our tongues spoke other until it was carved in threes and fours and fives
She said sing and he said sing and they said sing.
they all said sing sing
I said my heels are red, because one day a man got off a boat,
walked through a field and slapped his hand on the arch of a pondok
She said hie-jy jou moerskont kom huis toe
They said what is a home when it’s a protea tree,
when you grow upside down and the air anchor your roots
What is a home?
What is tied around your waist when a tortoise births caul covered hatchlings under your bed?
What is a home and what is a dream when all they do is fight?
She said why you look and kyk gelyk, am I miskien from golden gout gemake?
2022