My Distant Sister ~ Xolile Sizephe ~

Ten crippled someone was dialled but no phone rang. No one came charging in while the lights were out in her room… damn

The vibrations of her silent phone call shook my subconscious and lead me to that the unseen crime scene where the white outlines of childhood died. I Took a look at cadaver and what I saw was tell signs of struggle: wet lines that ran from eye to jaw, I singled out helplessness as the cause, next I came across puddles of tears drops, evidence of broken hearts and dejected dreams, so I followed these forlorn streams to blue coloured arms hidden under the long sleeves’ of cover ups, lies and social awkwardness to elude the questions and fuss.

The pieces were falling into place this child’s damp and aged face and eyes look like they have stared the devil in the face… maybe they have because she closes her eyes but doesn’t fall asleep. in fear of falling further when he creeps into dreams that aren’t mothered by imagination. Her nightmares trickle into reality. She is incomplete as her soul is filled with holes but I can’t get a ballistic match, I can’t dust the fingerprints on her thighs, I can’t calm her and tell her it will be okay when she cries. Father give her strength to make that call and forgive us all for simply listening and not acting. I can’t continue my investigation I can’t get her testimony cause the emotions of hate she feels fall out the jurisdiction of my page! But I can hold her hand lovingly in prayers and hug her tight never wanting to let go of my distant sister in my hopes will she heal only tomorrow knows.

Case closed

BrokeNscribE


© 2009 X Sizephe

... ~ Joseph Nii Allotey ~

who cares if lil children are dying,
afterall we watch their mother's crying.
we kick em in their stomachs even as they are dying
and look upon their infants as tho they are prying.
who dares accuse the other of lying,
when secretly both parties are smiling.

there is no solution, remedy, or resolution.
must wars continue without absolution
or are all our hopes and dreams tied to an illusional evolution?

© 2009 J N Allotey

Young Men's Struggles today ~ Joseph Nii Allotey ~

struggling young man had his palm glued to his head by the sweat of his brow

no matter how hard he worked, life always dealt him a fresh blow

Downcast, he surrendered to what he did not know,

nearing the end, every beating heart tends to take it slow.

Struggling young man released a deep sigh

all the while his eyes remained fastened to his left thigh

from the bar stool where he sat, he felt quite 'high'

regretfully he new in a few moments he'd have to say goodbye

Struggling young man swallowed a pill,red or white, he could no longer feel

He knew in phases his life would begin to peel,

His final moments, captured on life's golden reel.

© 2009 J N Allotey

My Thought ~ Lerato Sinaye Dowse ~

Tell me how Am i supposed
to write about ubuhle be Afrika xandibona
ukonakala..
OOOyyyiiini, Khanindimameleni
Ndimncinane ndingaka ndineecginga ezivuthiweyo..
Why wont you listen to us Zuma,
phela kwento oyaziyo zingooma zase'khwetheni
kwaz'ba uqhayisela bani kwedini ndini...
Ilizwe lethu laafa nguwe,nezi Youth League zakho
zikrwada, abazi nes'mamva, nto bayaziyo
ku thula oo Tata bethu ezihlalweni zabo...
benditshilo ndathi, ndinomlomo ovuthiweyo..

Arent we supposed to boast about our Beauty,
of a good lost heritage,
civilisation....Africanism...

Makhosi, if you can
throw your bones ask my forefathers
Tlatlamatjolo,
Mvelinqangi
Mfo ka Sisulu
Qamatha, Hector

YOU died for this freedom
to take it back....
its too much for the black man.....

© 2009 L S Dowse


finally a piece in an Afrikan Language more is to come . . .
as I said before it is the time of the Afrikan Writer!

Awakening ~ VuyoKazi S Yonke ~

Awakening to the dawn's lustre
Golden rays of light in my hand
Colouring the canvas in grand
Bold design, with words to mend
The pieces of a once broken land
Back to its natural beauty, our Motherland

Awakening to a collective voice
Resonating to the depths of my core
Documenting our legends and folklore
Witnessing Africa's ascent off the floor
Rising up, heading towards the door
To redeem her former glory once more

Awakening to lyrical harmonies
The dancing wind carrying on its wings
Evocative chantings of new beginnings
In harmony with the rhythmical drumming
Of Mother Nature's heart beat resounding
Intertwining tapestries of every living being

Awakening to a timeless dream
Of a place where stars radiate in daylight
Hand toting the swelling moon bright
Bathing Africa's dreams in glowing light
The poet's pen potent in its might
Catapulting thoughts to new heights

Awakening in majestic Africa
Bearer of life, cradle of humankind
Vessel of light, illuminating the blind
Spirit of knowledge,nourishing minds
In her treasure chest the world will find
Love that bind ties, uniting all humankind

© 2009 V S Yonke

Writings I Like...

The time of the Afrikan writer is now, and it is the responsibility of the Afrikan Writer to enlighten misinformed peoples of the world on Afrika's true identity.

This portal serves as a platform for some of the finest Afrikan Literature that I discover in its purest unedited form.

The material found here belongs to the respective writers and as such all copyrights rest with the writers in question.

Read, peruse and ingest...

commentary is extremely welcome...

revelations . . .

Its seriously ironical,
how they erect metal monuments
to self-proclaimed greatness
but alas
these structures are set pon clay foundations...

Our self Proclaimed champions sold us out
before ever picking up paper-machie spears
in the pretext of defending Afrika and
upholding her honour.
They stand guard as
confused cocktails intoxicate, rape and ravage her
self-same wimps turn around and piss on her
with claims that they working african magic to heal her wounds...

we cannot desire Change if we are unaware of our reasons for seeking her out
as such she will play us like a harlot scorned
others of confused decent have abused her
and continue to parade her nakedness
dragging her once good name
through dirt spewed from
they ever increasing deceptive activities.
Yes you Can!

the question still remains as to What Can you?

to fully understand and grasp our destination
we must acquaint ourselves with our story
nuff of history
the point from whence we came
must be known, otherwise
aimless wanderings,
exiled at home
such shall be our infinite plight....

fundamentalists ran amok in silent protest

witnesses guised in plain's view

manipulated the picture now sits skew

democracy an imported, ill-designed non-remedy

tragedy - is our static kinertia

re-educate, re-genesis . . .

© 2009 Emon Firé

loved once . . .

embarked pon a visually enhanced sojourn,
seeking that ever elusive enlightenment
the title deed of which maintained my possession,
with change as my navigator,
reality metamorphed inevitalbility underplayed.

en passant, self discovery attained
through the windows of another's glass house,
in which the owner oblivious of the status quo,
enthusiastically throws stones.
She beheld herself in MTV's mirror,
dissapointment swiftly delayed her period
- Re a kgana, ha re batla
her story already well told by time,
evan as change made herself at home

her slippery tongue painted countless mirages
across my gullible orgasm
- alas her artwork graced many galleries,
exclusivity-priceless yet availability reigned
alongside wanton indulgence,

a layman acting is, but a pretence . . .

© 2009 Emon Firé

I am an AfriCan!

A beautiful Speech - Inspirational and quite a Statement - Read and Know more...


Chairperson,
Esteemed President of the democratic Republic,
Honourable Members of the Constitutional Assembly,
Our distinguished domestic and foreign guests,
Friends,

On an occasion such as this, we should, perhaps, start from the beginning.

So, let me begin.



I am an African.

I owe my being to the hills and the valleys, the mountains and the glades, the rivers, the deserts, the trees, the flowers, the seas and the ever-changing seasons that define the face of our native land.

My body has frozen in our frosts and in our latter day snows. It has thawed in the warmth of our sunshine and melted in the heat of the midday sun. The crack and the rumble of the summer thunders, lashed by startling lightening, have been a cause both of trembling and of hope.

The fragrances of nature have been as pleasant to us as the sight of the wild blooms of the citizens of the veld.

The dramatic shapes of the Drakensberg, the soil-coloured waters of the Lekoa, iGqili noThukela, and the sands of the Kgalagadi, have all been panels of the set on the natural stage on which we act out the foolish deeds of the theatre of our day.

At times, and in fear, I have wondered whether I should concede equal citizenship of our country to the leopard and the lion, the elephant and the springbok, the hyena, the black mamba and the pestilential mosquito.

A human presence among all these, a feature on the face of our native land thus defined, I know that none dare challenge me when I say - I am an African!

I owe my being to the Khoi and the San whose desolate souls haunt the great expanses of the beautiful Cape - they who fell victim to the most merciless genocide our native land has ever seen, they who were the first to lose their lives in the struggle to defend our freedom and dependence and they who, as a people, perished in the result.

Today, as a country, we keep an audible silence about these ancestors of the generations that live, fearful to admit the horror of a former deed, seeking to obliterate from our memories a cruel occurrence which, in its remembering, should teach us not and never to be inhuman again.

I am formed of the migrants who left Europe to find a new home on our native land. Whatever their own actions, they remain still, part of me.

In my veins courses the blood of the Malay slaves who came from the East. Their proud dignity informs my bearing, their culture a part of my essence. The stripes they bore on their bodies from the lash of the slave master are a reminder embossed on my consciousness of what should not be done.

I am the grandchild of the warrior men and women that Hintsa and Sekhukhune led, the patriots that Cetshwayo and Mphephu took to battle, the soldiers Moshoeshoe and Ngungunyane taught never to dishonour the cause of freedom.

My mind and my knowledge of myself is formed by the victories that are the jewels in our African crown, the victories we earned from Isandhlwana to Khartoum, as Ethiopians and as the Ashanti of Ghana, as the Berbers of the desert.

I am the grandchild who lays fresh flowers on the Boer graves at St Helena and the Bahamas, who sees in the mind's eye and suffers the suffering of a simple peasant folk, death, concentration camps, destroyed homesteads, a dream in ruins.

I am the child of Nongqause. I am he who made it possible to trade in the world markets in diamonds, in gold, in the same food for which my stomach yearns.

I come of those who were transported from India and China, whose being resided in the fact, solely, that they were able to provide physical labour, who taught me that we could both be at home and be foreign, who taught me that human existence itself demanded that freedom was a necessary condition for that human existence.

Being part of all these people, and in the knowledge that none dare contest that assertion, I shall claim that - I am an African.

I have seen our country torn asunder as these, all of whom are my people, engaged one another in a titanic battle, the one redress a wrong that had been caused by one to another and the other, to defend the indefensible.

I have seen what happens when one person has superiority of force over another, when the stronger appropriate to themselves the prerogative even to annul the injunction that God created all men and women in His image.

I know what if signifies when race and colour are used to determine who is human and who, sub-human.

I have seen the destruction of all sense of self-esteem, the consequent striving to be what one is not, simply to acquire some of the benefits which those who had improved themselves as masters had ensured that they enjoy.

I have experience of the situation in which race and colour is used to enrich some and impoverish the rest.

I have seen the corruption of minds and souls in the pursuit of an ignoble effort to perpetrate a veritable crime against humanity.

I have seen concrete expression of the denial of the dignity of a human being emanating from the conscious, systemic and systematic oppressive and repressive activities of other human beings.

There the victims parade with no mask to hide the brutish reality - the beggars, the prostitutes, the street children, those who seek solace in substance abuse, those who have to steal to assuage hunger, those who have to lose their sanity because to be sane is to invite pain.

Perhaps the worst among these, who are my people, are those who have learnt to kill for a wage. To these the extent of death is directly proportional to their personal welfare.

And so, like pawns in the service of demented souls, they kill in furtherance of the political violence in KwaZulu-Natal. They murder the innocent in the taxi wars.

They kill slowly or quickly in order to make profits from the illegal trade in narcotics. They are available for hire when husband wants to murder wife and wife, husband.

Among us prowl the products of our immoral and amoral past - killers who have no sense of the worth of human life, rapists who have absolute disdain for the women of our country, animals who would seek to benefit from the vulnerability of the children, the disabled and the old, the rapacious who brook no obstacle in their quest for self-enrichment.

All this I know and know to be true because I am an African!

Because of that, I am also able to state this fundamental truth that I am born of a people who are heroes and heroines.

I am born of a people who would not tolerate oppression.

I am of a nation that would not allow that fear of death, torture, imprisonment, exile or persecution should result in the perpetuation of injustice.

The great masses who are our mother and father will not permit that the behaviour of the few results in the description of our country and people as barbaric.

Patient because history is on their side, these masses do not despair because today the weather is bad. Nor do they turn triumphalist when, tomorrow, the sun shines.

Whatever the circumstances they have lived through and because of that experience, they are determined to define for themselves who they are and who they should be.

We are assembled here today to mark their victory in acquiring and exercising their right to formulate their own definition of what it means to be African.

The constitution whose adoption we celebrate constitutes and unequivocal statement that we refuse to accept that our Africanness shall be defined by our race, colour, gender of historical origins.

It is a firm assertion made by ourselves that South Africa belongs to all who live in it, black and white.

It gives concrete expression to the sentiment we share as Africans, and will defend to the death, that the people shall govern.

It recognises the fact that the dignity of the individual is both an objective which society must pursue, and is a goal which cannot be separated from the material well-being of that individual.

It seeks to create the situation in which all our people shall be free from fear, including the fear of the oppression of one national group by another, the fear of the disempowerment of one social echelon by another, the fear of the use of state power to deny anybody their fundamental human rights and the fear of tyranny.

It aims to open the doors so that those who were disadvantaged can assume their place in society as equals with their fellow human beings without regard to colour, race, gender, age or geographic dispersal.

It provides the opportunity to enable each one and all to state their views, promote them, strive for their implementation in the process of governance without fear that a contrary view will be met with repression.

It creates a law-governed society which shall be inimical to arbitrary rule.

It enables the resolution of conflicts by peaceful means rather than resort to force.

It rejoices in the diversity of our people and creates the space for all of us voluntarily to define ourselves as one people.

As an African, this is an achievement of which I am proud, proud without reservation and proud without any feeling of conceit.

Our sense of elevation at this moment also derives from the fact that this magnificent product is the unique creation of African hands and African minds.

Bit it is also constitutes a tribute to our loss of vanity that we could, despite the temptation to treat ourselves as an exceptional fragment of humanity, draw on the accumulated experience and wisdom of all humankind, to define for ourselves what we want to be.

Together with the best in the world, we too are prone to pettiness, petulance, selfishness and short-sightedness.

But it seems to have happened that we looked at ourselves and said the time had come that we make a super-human effort to be other than human, to respond to the call to create for ourselves a glorious future, to remind ourselves of the Latin saying: Gloria est consequenda - Glory must be sought after!

Today it feels good to be an African.

It feels good that I can stand here as a South African and as a foot soldier of a titanic African army, the African National Congress, to say to all the parties represented here, to the millions who made an input into the processes we are concluding, to our outstanding compatriots who have presided over the birth of our founding document, to the negotiators who pitted their wits one against the other, to the unseen stars who shone unseen as the management and administration of the Constitutional Assembly, the advisers, experts and publicists, to the mass communication media, to our friends across the globe - congratulations and well done!

I am an African.

I am born of the peoples of the continent of Africa.

The pain of the violent conflict that the peoples of Liberia, Somalia, the Sudan, Burundi and Algeria is a pain I also bear.

The dismal shame of poverty, suffering and human degradation of my continent is a blight that we share.

The blight on our happiness that derives from this and from our drift to the periphery of the ordering of human affairs leaves us in a persistent shadow of despair.

This is a savage road to which nobody should be condemned.

This thing that we have done today, in this small corner of a great continent that has contributed so decisively to the evolution of humanity says that Africa reaffirms that she is continuing her rise from the ashes.

Whatever the setbacks of the moment, nothing can stop us now!
Whatever the difficulties, Africa shall be at peace!
However improbable it may sound to the sceptics, Africa will prosper!

Whoever we may be, whatever our immediate interest, however much we carry baggage from our past, however much we have been caught by the fashion of cynicism and loss of faith in the capacity of the people, let us err today and say - nothing can stop us now!

Thank you