“Ndiyaxolisa”

“Apart from its ignorant errors, the greatest folly of racism is to impoverish – by imprisoning in a foolhardy superior cocoon, enforcing famine amidst the riches of a sumptuous feast of otherness, differentness and diversity […] Diversity is about listening. The Constitution ensures that we hear. It is our choice to do so joyfully.” — Justice Edwon Cameron

 

A poet I respect said

‘white will always be wicked’.

Quiet words screaming

their meaning into muted

spaces.

 

The truth is that

I don’t like writing about race;

it sounds misplaced,

self-justifying,

guilty.

 

Even that single word

wields more weight than

this poem can bear,

so heavy it

cracks.

 

I cannot speak for whites.

I do not want to,

preferring to side with

Edwon Cameron’s

justice.

 

Take the stand silently

and nod:

I am privileged,

I may not understand, but

I hear. I see.

“Meaning Less”

“I went to the woods because I wanted to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life […] I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life” — Henry David Thoreau

 

Sometimes he tries to think of

deep and meaningful stuff

to fill some lines with,

casting into in a sea of words,

swimming and scattering

with the flashing silver fish.

 

‘There’s only so much to say

about a sunset’ he thinks,

walking along a beach

as the distant dunes become

violet with distance,

shimmering in the wind.

 

But that sunset repeats

over and over the world.

There is a place, right now,

where the earth rises into night,

sinks, spinning, into morning:

the poetry of motion renewed.

 

It’s not meaningful,

but it makes him smile,

sitting on the beach

as the light changes.

His is a meaningless life

lived to its deepest.

Conversation Lives On Part II

And, true to form, I felt the need to make some more remarks on the matter. Please read the rest of this conversation first, or just skip to the next post on your Reader:

I really am in love with this conversation and can’t resist another rejoinder! Firstly, I think I’ve perhaps muddied the waters a bit with Tolle by not giving him due credit. I actually haven’t read the whole book and was bit too hasty with some of my claims. In this, I defer entirely to you. Nevertheless, I still don’t like the description of the mind as a tool.

Conversation Lives On Part I

Happily, my close friend has replied to my previous post, so here it is, in four-part harmony:

Ok, I read your reply, and I have a response and I would also like to refine my argument. Also, you are so utterly infuriating, and I say that with complete and utter affection. Firstly I would like to reply to the Tolle thing and explain how I think you are perhaps misunderstanding his argument, if argument is what it could be called.

“Halfway House”

‘… but shalt possess

A paradise within thee, happier far”

— Paradise Lost, XII, 585-6

 

Sometimes he feels like

the mathematical man,

always walking

halfway home.

 

It’s kind of exciting,

to walk with

somewhere to go,

knowing that he’ll never

quite get there.

 

That he will always

be touched by

otherness,

lacking homogeneity.

It’s only when he finds

infinity within

that he’ll realise how

close he’s been,

all this time.

Conversation Lives!

I am in the middle of a fascinating conversation with a close friend that I feel needs to be shared with a wider audience. You can find her argument here.

Read it first – it’s exceptionally good. Here is my reply:

It’s difficult to find an entry point into Emma’s argument, because I agree with so much of it. However, there are a few points which I think need to be disputed, if only for the value of argument and how it furthers thought, not because they are necessarily false. I think it perhaps best to start with Eckhart Tolle, because he seems to have influenced much of what Emma claims.

“On Reading”

There is a rare pleasure in

reading a good book,

legs stretched out to catch

the last afternoon rays,

languidly on the lawn –

taking a dip in serenity

to form fateful connections

and other worlds

in the minds of strangers,

narrated by you.

 

It makes me sad

to hear the clock chime,

knowing this afternoon

will never be again,

but I remember reading

that the sun does not set,

it is the earth which

rises into night,

carrier of our soaring feelings

and broken hearts alike.

 

An orange monarch floats by,

ruler of her airy kingdom,

and my thoughts fly alongside

forgetting reading, writing,

sunsets, satisfaction.

 

for a moment i am

 

Then the butterfly is gone and

I stretch to catch the light again,

gazing at my book,

continuing to read our world.