Soweto

Out of this roar of innumerable demons hot cinema tarzan sweat rolling moth ball eyes yellow teeth cries of claws slashes clanks a faint high pallor dust oceans rolling over the dry sand of the savanna your houses homes warm still with the buffalo milk bladder of elephant . tusk of his stripped tree sing soft clinks but the barracks the dark dark barks of the shark boys the cool juice of soweto . . . out of this dust they are coming our eyes listen out of rhinoceros thunder darkness of lion the whale roar stomping in heaven that black bellied night of hell and helleluia when all the lights of anger flicker flicker flicker flicker and we know somewhere there there is real fire basuto mokhethi namibia azania shaka the zulu kenyatta the shatt erer the maasai wandering into the everlasting shadow of jah daughters lost daughters bellowing against bullhorn and kleghorn bellowing against bargwart and the searchlights of dogs bellowing against crick and the kick in the stomach the acrid wretch against the teeth bellowing against malan malan malam malan and boer and boerwreck and boertrek and truckloads of metal helmet and fusil and the hand grenade and acid rhodes and the diamonds of oppenheimer the opulence of voortresshers the grass streiders . . . suddenly like that fire the crows in johannesburg you were there torn. in tears. tatters but the eyes glittered and the fist clenching around that scream of your mother bled into a black head of hammers and the night fell howl on soweto the night fell howl on soweto and we who had failed to listen all. those. foot. steps who had given you up like a torn paper package your heroes       burning in your houses rising from your dust bowls flaring from the sky listen now as the news items lengthen gathering like hawks looking upward like the leopard plunging into the turmoil like the constrictor and that crouch/shot shout out against that beast and pistol the police who shot patrice who castrated kimathi and clattering clattering clattering clattering the veldts gun metals wings rise from their last supper their hunger of bones bomba and the daniels sing ukufa akuqheleki kodwa ke kuthiwa akuhlanga lungehlanga lalani ngenxeba nikhuzeka