Editor, thanks for the poets’ column.

I'm here, still alive and no poet;

I carry the milkpail across the Orange;

I look old with a beard like Hili.

Thus the small voice of Lamentations

saying “Jehovah, can you hear?”

Jehovah says in response:

“I've been quiet for days, until yesterday.

You've been weighed and found to be wanting.”

The Ancient Creator's voice struck home.

The fingers’ inscription proclaims

your kingdom's been taken, handed to others.

Go back to where you came from,

to Ntsikana's final words.

Don't bargain with the truth:

this cash led us astray.

Christians, where are your bibles today?

I'd better stop, so I don't lose control.

Maqoma said so, and they called him mad

for spurning the madness of surrender.

What must we make of these marriages?

Wed and split in a day: where's this from?

We sit on the fence, won't take a stand,

the walking dead unfamiliar to God.

We make a big thing of this schooling:

and this culture we eagerly hound.

We pinned our hopes on a miracle:

some died with nothing to show for it.

We bear envy and blame one another;

God leaves as we claw at each other.

Today, we've lost ourselves,

our leaders all sit mum.

All our customs were lost to the whites,

we took separate paths to the cells.

The old voice said, “You're dying, Africa.”

The gainsayers countered: “How can she die?”

All our thieves are in school,

all our witches in school,

all our liars in school:

which is the One on High to believe?

Will the Reds ever be Christian?

We pose as just, so they waver.

And what then of our parents?

We just left them shut in their homes.

We gave up polygamy; today we take lovers;

we gave up ochre, but now we're all drunk.

Hear what I say, Greybeard of ours,

those are the headings in our discussion.

The word of God's the very truth

but we've treated it inconsistently.

We perish for lack of diviners

as if every home housed a witch.

Mercy!!