Compton's Place,
Mbabane
I opened the door
to the mist in the night
and found a bundle of dry reeds
moss on one of them
all the same length
neatly on the doorstep.
I threw them into the mist,
angry.
Here’s what I think of your charms and spells,
I said to the night.
I must keep death out
wash the walls
light candles
tell beads
untie the spiderwebs.
Scorpion on the white plate waits for me
and all the children are insane.
"I always tried to keep the kitchen clean,"
I tell my mother-in-law in a dream.
Rain hangs on window panes
and dangles outside the ledge
in the no-wind.
One rose, soaked with mist,
shines pink through the steamed-up window.
Strange bundles of thatch
on the doorstep again
dry like the shongololo
curled up on the floor.
I saw cracks in the walls
where no cracks were.
Tomorrow I’ll start
washing the walls
and the curtains
and the floors.
(In collection, ‘Poems from Mt Moono’, Hippogriffe Press, 1989.)
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