The stench-of-vomit kind of poverty
Fill up on liquor as poor as the drinker
"hot stuff": cheap as street-walker home brew
Fill up on liquor as poor as the drinker
"hot stuff": cheap as street-walker home brew
Friday's right for Phuza night
racist employers are drowned down
"drive your own damn bakkie, Mr Patel"
"please drive yourself straight to hell"
racist employers are drowned down
"drive your own damn bakkie, Mr Patel"
"please drive yourself straight to hell"
Another round for the wife who left with
my neighbour
my neighbour
That desperate-kind-of-poverty
not the Sunday-Church-kind-of-poor
more like the poverty of Friday night
Just as long as the price is right
twenty rand extra for no protection
nothing to lose when you're so far
at the bottom.
ARV's are free
Let the grant money work,
she's a mother of three
not the Sunday-Church-kind-of-poor
more like the poverty of Friday night
Just as long as the price is right
twenty rand extra for no protection
nothing to lose when you're so far
at the bottom.
ARV's are free
Let the grant money work,
she's a mother of three
I drink and curse and stab and smoke
You want to judge my morality?
uMama was looking after you
when she was supposed to be breastfeeding me.
You want to judge my morality?
uMama was looking after you
when she was supposed to be breastfeeding me.
I came home , washed my uniform for school
the next day
uBaba worked for your dad
for a donkey's pay.
now he's bent and broken
with no pension fund
and you throw him out,
like a used lappie.
the next day
uBaba worked for your dad
for a donkey's pay.
now he's bent and broken
with no pension fund
and you throw him out,
like a used lappie.
So judge me Doctor while you stand there,
wondering what scum the ambulance dragged in.
uGogo was washing your medschool lab coat
while I was pacifying the little ones.
wondering what scum the ambulance dragged in.
uGogo was washing your medschool lab coat
while I was pacifying the little ones.
So let me have my Friday Night.
You think I can't smell the poverty?
I catch a whiff too.
Maybe a gust of change
will flow through , and
I could be just like you,
leaving this place
on Sanitised Saturday.
You think I can't smell the poverty?
I catch a whiff too.
Maybe a gust of change
will flow through , and
I could be just like you,
leaving this place
on Sanitised Saturday.
3 comments:
I'm still reeling from the effects of this poem. It has a haunting honesty that's rendered so beautifully. It made me think of Michel de Montaigne, 'Poverty of goods is easily cured; poverty of soul impossible.'
The poem evokes a sense of a 'Frightening Reality', which is too real for comfort.
Although we understand the effects of poverty and the harm it courses, we sometimes overlook the effects of poverty and the harm it courses.
We begin to view poverty through a specific lens that suites us, and that does not shake our comfort zones.
Without exposure, we tend to forget about the true and exisiting realities on the ground that affects the level of poverty and at times perpetuates the cycle even further.
Thank You for such an honest account
this is fascinating commentary in poetry! well done... i attended a seminar at Time of the Writer last year about the Laugh-it-Off Organisation; the guys who had to deal with the court cases with re to Carling and the 'Black Labour,White Guilt' case. this was great to read!
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