Belonging

Darwin Franks

1.
I’m searching Granny,
rummaging through the attics of the dusty night sky,
extending my hand
through cobwebs in the clouds,
and missing links in the darkness;
there, in that place, time or space,
to catch the dreaming tail of a light
born before eyes were wet with universal longing;
there to make my mark;
there to grab hold of all my uncertainties
crashing like waves against a promenade.

2.
Our history,
threaded in parts
with the detail of a mandala
(not quite amandla!);
flagged in areas
with colours of sundry
(on the border line of memory!);
our history, our marks
papered against these walls
that hold my triumphs and convictions,
my desires and conflicts,
my poems and long lost epitaphs;
our history,
line for line bringing me closer to my self:
like a hand touching itself in a mirror,
or a raindrop merging with a tear.

3.
Then yesterday
rain, thunder and regret rode out on the cold, grey morning,
eroding, as they passed, the scorched hearts of our desolated relations
who live now as if everyday is Sunday,
as if everyday is the aftermath of a war;
our relations
who guard themselves like prisoners
against the nurses caring on the other side of the door.

4.
With dull light I represent them,
in still portraits I frame them,
as I have known them,
as I have changed them,
and their wills,
their scabrous, crusty wills
that balance like black cats on the fringes of a windowsill.

LitNet: 14 February 2006

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