double-helixed uBuntu

double-helixed uBuntu.

these interwoven veins,
dna,
double-helixed,

microscopic,
binding us, all of us,
together, as one,

species, one race,
human,

me & you

us,
all,

through
this common
shared
truth:

‘I am because you are’*

all of us
together
as one

me & you = uBuntu*

* – uBuntu is an isiXhosa/isiZulu concept that espouses the “belief in a universal bond of sharing that connects all humanity”

We forget …

We forget the newly independent Tanzania, Zambia, and other ‘Front line States’ in the struggle against Apartheid tyranny.

We forget the burdens they shouldered as they embodied the very essence of that very humane of philosophies – uBuntu – I am because we are.

We forget the Apartheid foe foment civil-wars in Mozambique by incubating Renamo as a counter-revolutionary force against Frelimo.

We forget Unita in Angola battling the MPLA.

We forget Koevoet in Namibia fighting SWAPO.

We forget The Battle of Cuito Cuanavale.

We forget The Wankie Campaign.

We forget …

We forget much.

For Comrade and President Oliver Reginald Tambo ( 1917 – 1993 )

For Comrade and President Oliver Reginald Tambo (1917 – 1993)

Escaping the omnipresent shadows,

eluding the sweaty palms of the torturer,

running to shed this sorry skin of shame,

in hiding, here and there, with no one,

yet everyone to silently blame.

Leaving the lips once kissed behind,

to a refuge impossible to find,

not a word of sad welcome,

severing all ties that bind.

And then finally off to a new dwelling in a faraway alien land,

reeking and drenched in a foreignness so blatantly bland,

never fitting in, though always dreading being shut out,

singing paeans to hope scribbled in the sand.

You left your country, your home, your very own place of being,

you fled, into exile, far away from blinded eyes so unseeing,

and you held to a principle within, and you stood resolute,

till the shadows felt themselves in shame fleeing,

We salute you! And all like you, and the so many countless more,

into whose flesh the tyrant’s sword so cruelly tore,

We salute you! You who fought at home and you who left to fight,

from afar, on often a bleak and distant shore

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