POETRY

Banana Seeds
_
Graves forgotten,
we refused to lie in unfinished coffins,
we learnt to listen to
our conscience speaking through
coughing voices,
our hearts stopped awakening
our nostrils,
our own reflections became living fossils,
blanketed with pity,
marinated with mortuary lotions,
died from engineered
witchcraft potions,
our parents' eyes died carrying
sadness bags under their eyelids,
painted with sexual immorality,
they saw us as the children
lacking a descent mortality,
our death rate was another
consequential statistic,
they forgot our human nature,
scolded our blood streams,
layered our bodies on church
pulpits, pointed at our corpses
and declared that the devil had become human.
_
We dined with pain,
humans who had their
humanity stolen from them,
they said we smuggled our health
to gain instant wealth,
our lungs were said to be
sealed with plagues,
dreams got shuttered,
we mastered the art of being mentally buttered,
they buttoned our flesh to
deathbeds,
injected us with syringes that
we traced back to Ham's curse,
infact some think this is
about some melanin consequence,
only if you knew you would
relate,
we are the children born
from our fathers' concubines,
our mothers were harlots looting
other men's wallets,
propaganda painted us
as Pharisees with leprosy,
we were skinned and we
regretted to be alive,
shackled to the curses
of our umbilical cords,
we were out of range of
God's voice,
our own whispers cursed
us as sons and daughters of hoes.
_
We drank life from the
sac of our own bladder,
found starch from other
people's leftovers,
sheltered by the smell of
medicinal pills,
our bones grew thin and
thinner, we began to
play marimba tunes from the
cavity of our own fragile
bones.
Love left us,
our own breath disowned us,
we learnt to inhale the
dioxide, some of us
died from hanged ropes
necklacing our biltong necks,
twitching bodies, suicide
notes falling,
life leaving as we recited verses,
we rode the evaporating tears,
the heavens welcoming us
dearly.
_
Most of you don't know us,
but we live amongst you,
we laugh with you,
listen to your problems that
sound too cute to pity,
your struggles that simply
define the simplicity of our lives,
we smile through those admired
white teeth,
we are the artists painting
reality as we live it,
your eyes are our canvases,
look at us,
are we not such beautiful
curses, caged in the
judgment of your voices,
we live, we laugh, we listen,
we are martyrs of a crooked
generation, slaughtered by your double-edged tongues, wedding wears with chapel or court train
we have learnt and understood
the value of life,
it's not like chess,
or some Japanese Go',
it is simply what you'll never know!!!
We are amongst you,
rare to find; banana seeds!!
By Matome Molele