Sinenhlanhla
She brightened like a child whose broken toy is glued together,
summon tears as one summons servants,
and danced like a flower in the wind.
She disclaimed the weariness,
that dragged upon her spirits like leaden weights,
exude a faint and intoxicating perfume of womanliness,
like a crushed herb,
and felt like an unrepentant criminal.
She flounders like a huge conger-eel
in an ocean of dingy morality,
gave me a surprised look,
like a child catching an older person in a foolish statement,
and gave off antipathies as a liquid gives off vapor.
She has great eyes like the doe,
heard me like one in a dream,
and let the soft waves of her deep hair fall,
like flowers from Paradise.
She looked like a tall golden candle,
moved like mirth incarnate,
and saw this planet,
like a star hung in the glistening depths of even.
She seemed as happy
as a wave that dances on the sea,
walks in beauty like the night,
brilliant, and as hard too, as electric light,
silent, standing before me like a little statuesque figure.
By Seth Yuhi Musinga
|