I Am In Trouble So Bad

Introduction This poetry collection is a culmination of the many poetry recitals that were done during the period 1996 to 1998 at the University of Zimbabwe by the members of the UZ Creative Writers Association. The platform for these recitals was granted through the goodwill of the members of the Theatre Arts Department, notably FK Omoregie, Owen Seda and Ethel Dhlamini. Compiling and editing this anthology was no easy task because the participants were drawn from diverse worlds: singers, journalists, psychologists, biologists, pharmacists and so on. Poetry, it appears, cuts across disciplines. The message that is being communicated in these poems is quite profound, refreshing and therapeutic in a sense. For the twenty-five years that Zimbabwe has been independent quite a lot of dramatic events have happened. Once upon a time the country was regarded as a jewel and a bread basket of the entire Southern African Development Community but today it is sad to realise that Zimbabwe has become a mere basket case. On the educational front Zimbabwe was well known for its highly skilled professionals across disciplines. Today all the able-bodied professionals have fled into the diaspora where they swallow their pride and do menial tasks in foreign capitals. I discovered this script “I am in Trouble So Bad” in my moments of soul-searching as I was perusing some of the luggage which I had mistaken for baggage. Although patching together this script has not been an easy task, at least the experience and exercise has been therapeutic. It is a direct commentary of what is happening in Zimbabwe. Somebody has to say something about what is happening in a country that the world had so much hope in which is now heading towards the cataracts. These poets are merely responding in their diverse ways. Whether they are right or wrong it’s not for me to judge. History will judge them. The problem with Zimbabwean commentators and politicians is that they have tried enormously to reduce the Zimbabwean crisis into a Zimbabwe Versus Britain game yet common-sensically we defeated the British in 1980, twenty-five choking years ago. Others have reduced the whole debate into a two-tier problem: the Ruling Zanu-PF and the Opposition MDC Party polarity. The anthology has in a big way avoided this approach. It discusses the general problems Zimbabweans are facing from HIV and AIDS, university life and its challenges in contemporary Zimbabwe, the political and social forces that are 1

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blowing in the country. The poets in a way offer various discussions and solutions to these problems. Of particular interest is Albert Nyathi. He is one of the singers in the post 1990 era. He remarks that “time’s giant tooth/ has eaten deep into our flesh…” So to heal this wound the sacrifice has to be big also. He feels that perennially begging or in other words turning our politicians into professional beggars in foreign capitals cannot solve the solution to our many domestic problems. He finds it dramatic and awkward at the same time that the political establishment finds it easy to swiftly suppress student protests using teargas and anti-riot police yet back in “the parliamentary buildings…sleep and hangover outplay thought and plan”. Elliot Magunje in “Fat Cats” observes that the generality of the population is scrounging for a living yet a class of ‘fat cats’ is fast emerging: “like tricks on cows’ backs they multiply”. And in “All I want” Patrick Mudavhanu militantly bursts: “All I want is to blow the trumpet and make thunder…. To create a bolt of lightning in this indigo blackness”. Frustration, anger, despair, betrayal and disillusionment characterise the poetry. Jethro Mpofu in “My Private Anthem” warns those who are unleashing terror on the masses: “I am the uncensored version of a violent movie…the active volcano gods had bribed but soon I will erupt and burn them alive…” Overall, this anthology answers the questions: what is really the Zimbabwean Crisis? What ought to be done to correct the crisis?

ML Gunduza Head: Enhanced Skills International Research and Training Institute, Pretoria, South Africa

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O My Land! It’s not AIDS but cancer That will kill us slowly The way AIDS has slowly thrown its punches right in our faces, Each punch sure enough To land someone beneath our soles Tell the dog to learn The skills of hunting for itself By itself, on its own, and build its own confidence, hope and home! Time’s giant tooth Has eaten deep into our flesh politics has no room for serious thinkers here Here all you need is: Speak some language Come from somewhere Be of some colour Smile to every insane joke Nod to a gain lie! It’s all there is to it here MaAfrica, we know The source of our perennial begging But we’d rather not hear about it We see but we’d rather look elsewhere Where our eyes will not be ashamed, Where our nose will not be blocked by the stench of reality That like absent clouds Covers this domain called ‘Our land!’ My land kuze kube nini bo! Albert Nyathi

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Varsity Grounds A place to know who you are, To silently admire girls as they pass ‘Silence please lectures in Progress’ To silently digest Franz fanon And Walter Rodney To silently digest Amilcar Cabral and Ngugi wa Thiong’ o To silently, slowly fart out the liberal poison you long harboured in the stomach of your brains University grounds! A place to take it or leave it You either grow or simply suffocate Confusion! The love passions outgrowing the Bible men at the Students’ Union Bar The miniskirts simply bending over, The car seats turning into bedrooms, The beer bottle sight encouraging the son’s daughter to postpone the writing of the assignment! The Administration block under the storm Under the siege of academic guerrillas Under heavy stress of drunken stamping, stamp, stampeding feet, The grounds! The varsity grounds! Here the hearts find each other, Here the hearts get instantly lost in Orientation Weeks, Here you search for a clean heart Like you search for the clean needle in a haystack,

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Here you see passions go unanswered, That finally find their hearts in city bars And the innocent unknowing bloods Soon are baptised in pools of holy Penicillin! Here the virgin’s thigh throws apart like the breaking of a great dawn and feels like Independence Day, The Rhodesian flag hesitantly sinking In these, our solemn ground We also learn the holy art: — stone-throwing- — Is it not true many a gumboots has broken ribs? The baton stick been handy in matters of state discipline?

Albert Nyathi

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The Miniskirt Flies Under Pressure A mind stopped, The bar haunted with countenances painted, My eyes unblinking in search The bar smelling of sweat and cigarettes Smelling of vomit and milk-spattered Boobs and mouths unwashed for days immemorial She scooped me in her mini-skirts, I followed, like a dying sheep, soundless She stuck out ten fingers No ways! Tomorrow I would stand before God and confess before his highness, the Priest and would be fine — God forgives! We crossed over to some Hararean alley And the guard brushed us away With a rough voice and we drove on, In search of some greener pasture Long grass! But first this! Listen you Xian poet Whose eyes would not search but speaks in abstract tongues She lay on this natural carpet did all the job; So long the ten fingers command Dollar coins clicked in her purse The hissing of the grass! The compression of the undergrowth The tuneful whistling of the air! The calling of names recordable by memory.

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In tongues the kind that blasts the church roofs when Xians are caught in the power of holy ghost At some spying mission the stroke! The move The scientific method! some electric current! the spine! some eel crawls in there! Uncomfortable yet enjoyable Some distant drumbeat, the crack! Dawn New world! Oh! It’s all over, I face dawn with a shy eye

Albert Nyathi

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Where? Ngaphi? Kupi Ko? At the Students Union Bar Where Beer and Book outplay the revolutionary hooligan Beer, the appetizer, and Book, the very dinner upon which we should feed but teargas in wait for a solemn dessert! At the Christian Union Building Where Bible and Book outscore Jesus’ wants! and there hangs about our vanity in the ceilings of our holy bibles, Where the anti-Christ are hollies and the Koran bears sinful verses, and our ancestors are pronounced witches! During “open days” in the complexes Where unsuspecting girls are raped In our great graders Cressidas Where AIDS slumbers, in wait! In our hungry Africa Where stoutness of purse measures to love and to marry a sure forerunner to divorce! At the braais where double-crossing is the pattern of the evening in lecture rooms Where professor loves to tell about the many degrees that he fought for While others fought a war of guns! Fought for a freedom that never came??? Fought only to be demobilised! Fought only to get food for work!

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In the factories where sweat Fuels the very heart of man’s greed! In the farms where both Hand and heart have been hardened and the sun always rises To tell the same old stories, but our eyes continue to see New things in the rays when the sun rises each day In the parliamentary buildings where sleep and hangover outplay thought and plan and talk on unemployment is adjourned Always! Always! Always! The vision doubles up Glides and grins from the East But our wants are outdone By the wild herb That we do sniff in hope To fuel thought! When Sun at her noon does play hide-and-seek with Moon in Moon’s noon Then we shall ask the many eyes that do view these scandals in our main playgrounds!

Albert Nyathi

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Bulawayo Tell me if this is you Land of the spirits If this is you Who lost faith in yourself? Tell me, For these doubts Are sure enough to split What holds your ashes together Mystery of my land tell me! Where once was Lobengula’s feet now lies stone The great Indaba tree has not spoken since and the innocent unknowing bloods His lips were sewn together for over a century now By the demands of the times, Yet again sit still and look ahead From the King’s old Bulawayo The ashes rose tall to create new Modern Bulawayo

Albert Nyathi

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Letter to the President I wanted to write You a letter I wanted to tell You, To tell you that Your people are Suffering But I thought you would answer “They are not my people. They are only my people during election time!” I wanted to write to you a letter, to tell you that enough is enough That the atmosphere is pregnant with Revolution That very soon you shall hear war cries That sooner or later much sooner than later There shall be gnashing of teeth but I thought you would answer “We have put a mechanism to deal with any uprising!” This letter I will write This letter shall remain on my mind But just like a sin in mind is a sin committed, A letter in mind is a letter written Sign it?

Percy F. Makombe

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I Could Have Written you on Wednesday But I was Afraid I intended to tell you that I am experiencing the horrors of prison Suffering because of innocence Perhaps Thrasymachus was right After all, isn’t justice the interest of the Strangers? Three security guards, two in green uniforms, holding broom sticks, and one plain clothed a ‘tiny toy’ in his hand that is how it began, with those loyal warders thrashing us and confiscating our IDs no room for negotiations for they wanted to justify their existence on campus On Tuesday we got locked up at Avondale Police Station pictures, fingerprints and other details were taken I am afraid my picture might be in the newspaper Then on Wednesday we were taken to Rotten Row Criminal Court the PP proclaimed our entrance that we were better off in remand prison than out on bail lest we would abscond and go into hiding so now the trial is on 23 April

I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS Fortune the cell is but a torture chamber, a small room the size of a Blair toilet a small hole at a far corner Stinking choking It stinks of shit and urine of sickening death We are fifty in this cell But there is one man who has arrested my attention The man is dead though he is still living always scratching and plucking off the flesh that still clings to his bones eating his sacred flesh I am seeing a lot of funny and disgusting things here and I happen to be out, I shall tell you more Well Fortune I have no day or night Afraid of those who threaten other men at night And whenever I sleep I wrap myself In my biting lice-infested rag As for the food here Let me not bother you Let me not go into details Bear with me, Fortune Of the meals I shall maintain nothing More Lest I vomit again! When you come to see me Please bring me slippers, lotion, comb and Towel

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS I haven’t taken a bath since I left college, And by the way, we are already in khakhi uniforms Mberikunashe clothes By the way, to visit a prisoner Is only once per week and for Strictly five minutes Say hie to Betty And please, Fortune, Tell her I am fine

Phineas Chinyanga

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The Pain of Promises During our heydays my love We could carefully choose Which roods to tread on Which rivers to cross Which fruits to pluck And which dances to rehearse Promises spread As a whole infinite galaxy I would accept unquestioningly For with you nothing was impossible As long as the sky Remained blue with hope Each night you would carry me to unfathomable golden heights to unknown heavens of bliss where even angles never dreamt to set foot Now, like a plane taking off in sand All those promises Have pain fully fallen on the rocks leaving me in the desert a mere castaway, after-wash froth and in pain…

Mufaro Gunduza

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I Won’t Die Yesterday I may fail to go on today but I wont die yesterday If I fail to live to see tomorrow Yesterday I won’t be dead My sun may refuse to rise my night may forget to dawn no ways! I won’t die yesterday You want me to die yesterday? Why, isn’t that too late? you could kill me today but if I have lived today And may live to see tomorrow then I can’t die yesterday.

Felex Mafume-Mutasa

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Down With It I lay down these lines With all the Gs in my ear I let out the flow, As best as I can, I keep it sweet and soft, to show you I Know Their lyrics don’t come easy But my heart’s pounding fast, Throwing them up my mind, I’m a neat little rhythm, I’m waiting right here, won’t leave you Behind Your words keep on singing, and my pulse keeps on racing, oh, my heart starts to sing, I just want to show you I’m down with the love thing

Fungai James Tichawangana

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Gangraped History is not found in those books; it’s written on the discarded people’s faces Wonder? Wait? The people are the living history Books Where it is written in bold: we are tired of this voyage through razor-sharp life; to us, Harare is a barren wilderness: We can’t find release from the fetters Of unemployment; When we sell our warmth to men it’s not a sign of immorality it’s a symptom of this decaying rule Damn! you pack of human jackals in power why gang rape this country?

Tirivacho Makwarimbe

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On Her Death Bed Look! Zimbabwe is groaning, sinking under wagon- loads of misery Harare is pregnant with uncountable demonstrationsthe workers’ cheeks are spent, eroded By tears but the government is a pharaoh that says to the wailing citizens we donate baton sticks and teargas these Hararean streets reek of Manufactured poverty Destitute upon destitute whose composition ranges from, bastards to the discarded ex- combatants. Damn! Heaven where are your ears? you in the underworld where are your ears? our tears are restless like the sun: The nation is on corruption’s notorious Idle countrymen, where will your barren silence lead us to? the nation is already on her death bed!

Tirivacho Makwarimba

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Entrance Walls tumbling down Erection of firmer walls Vexation of the spirit A decomposition A decomposition heh! Just it Licking and lurking flames Just arrows and rays Why? Deny it Germinate Live and rot Fine In the struggle for ascendance where does descendance dwell to lose face and the being this is madness madness with passion passion, what passion to explode the throat The knife kissing adam’s apple is it a defeat or victory to live when there is a yearning to be the other though not to die is it a victory to engage and marry death to embrace and cuddle him Gliding into oblivion though eternal is it ecstatic?

Willias Masocha

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I Don’t Need No Other Hell I don’t need no other hell When from the womb I wheeze and pant Groan and writhe Not from sores of mishaps From mine forefathers passed down I don’t need no other hell When with pain and groaning I kneel and pray To undo the deed Not my doing Silence is the answer I don’t need no other hell When not in illusions I behold Brother slit brother’s throat Not for misunderstanding Understanding that to reign Brother’s guts need be out I don’t need no other hell When on this cosmos Guilty or innocent Writhe in its fires Brother burning me not to ashes If it were he would I don’t need no other hell From my lips to let go the cry Justice comes from nowhere Above or below Besides from the people In hell who do writhe

Willias Masocha

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Let’s Change our Dressing It is militating against our existence We are teetering on the brink of Destruction and extinction there is a pressing desire to alter our dressing it is rotten as it is repugnant but gravely deadly or dressing is vulnerable it is susceptible To AIDS which has no panacea Men! Women! Take heed to head ahead in life the only panacea is a cultural Revolution from this Deceptive, immoral dressing More detrimental to existence It is time for a cultural revolution which is a positive evolution Take heed!

Abramiah M. Mponda

I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

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The True Prison It is not the leaking roof Nor the singing mosquitoes In the dump, wretched cell It is not the clank of the key As the warden locks you in It is not the measly rations Unfit for man or beast Nor yet the emptiness of the day Dipping into the blankness of night It is not It is not It is not It is the lies that have been drummed up Into your ears for one generation It is the security agent running amok Executing callous orders in exchange for a wretched meal a day The magistrate writing in her book punishment she knows is undeserved The moral decrepitude Mental ineptitude lending dictatorship spurious legitimacy cowardice masked as obedience lurking in our denigrated souls. it is fear damping trousers we dare not wash of our urine it is this it is this it is this Dear friend, turns our free world into a dreary prison.

Ken Saro-wiwa

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All I Want All I want to do is blow the trumpet and make thunder, all I want is to create a bolt of lightning in this indigo blackness all I want is to see people cast smiles to Their faces and say, ”oh, look, we are People, we are living” that is what I want, to see people live Wanting to be alive but my sister I am a sad brother, brother I am a sad man But I do not want to be sad yet countrymen, I am SAD.

Panavanhu Mudavanhu

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Fire in the Country What the man sees The mouth cannot utter Hunger screams as poverty Develops wings Mind boggling experiences Stifling the cries from within The black starved bodies muddled in mud Thrown helter-skelter in the sea of poverty Nothing except hunger, Which declare in unison: “povo yaramba zvemadhisinyongoro!” where can we work well and get reasonable wages? time shall come when revolution shall swallow some now time to strive, to seek, to find and to yield!

Percy F Makombe

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This City Stinks! This city stinks! Each station is a broken up Sewage pipe The air is heavily pregnant with stench Inviting battalions of flies Black cats, rats… This city stinks, my friend but only recently was a multi-thousand dollar ceremony, the inauguration of an executive Mayor who had rigged his way They wined They celebrated They sang and danced But listen O people this city stinks! The last donation disappeared between donor-fingers and pot-holed roads Our cornfields are wet with sewage water our gardens are wet with sewage water Our backyards are rotting with sewage water now listen, my friend The city stinks!

Mufaro Gunduza

I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

These Things Make Me Sick! When I think of this Museum of financial mismanagement thesis of economic betrayal Mortuary of pathological stagnancy These galleries of political Incompetence chancers in chaotic charades hoping that tomorrow will be a better day these things, my friend make me sick! I can hear a faint sound, my friend echoes and waves, though in silence Words from broken lips cries from sorrowful civil servants curses from the jobless youths a living testimony of economic defeat hatched by those Presiding in the golden nuggets of power These things, my friend Make me sick! The bleeding wounds these broken aspirations amidst the deployment of armoured cars and live ammunition these things, my friend make me sick! Only time will blow the trumpet heralding new seasons the will of the people shall prevail I wake up to realise that You send messages of peace From your comfort zone yet us in the shantiest of the shanties Die slowly in economic languor

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS I can’t parade my hunger lest you stab me with a bullet I can’t grab food for my stomach For you will call it “hooliganism” But truly speaking, your habits have no trace of “humanism” should we all perish who, my dear king, will you rule?

Mufaro Gunduza

I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

I Miss Kumusha The fresh smell of warm cow-dung on a rainy morning in the kraal I miss my roots The endless tales of witchcraft Wizards riding on hyenas Witches chewing dead men’s bones with delight I miss village folks The smell of raw tobacco The sight of tobacco-stained yellow teeth Like ant-eaten mealie-cobs I miss night dances Wild excitements on moonlights I miss my kith and kin Quenching throats with muchaiwa and mupeta Strong traditional brews I miss shivering like reed in water After the hooting of an owl On pitch dark nights Shacking my spine in fear The crying gulls, hyenas……… I miss traditional tunes The mbira lyrics Boom-booming deep sounds Of the African drum Ejecting beats of ecstasy In the motherland I miss the cracked course hands in Greeting The scratched hard feet that talk about labour resilience, bare survival ….

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS I miss chsing girls by the river banks the tender sweet voices the bright and blooming faces The gourds and calabashes the grazing fat cows Old Musharukwa whistling as he tills the fields birds singing on tree-tops the fledging wheat heads millet heads real signs of hope I miss kumusha I miss my roots

Mufaro Gunduza

I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

Dead Men Walking Yesterday’s existence, with warming parties infested nature and humanity not in collaboration yet we survived, strove for a better world and along corridors of time, hope was to come Then I flipped another page to centre-spread of today’s hungry history a filthy battered vision of hope in stranglehold For in stark clarity, with no holds Barred Were crudities of existence, yelling from The splayed pages Of the AIDS-threatened life of us tonight Dawn of the collapse of humanity Whose soul-decayed eyes Sunken deep in brazen sockets Only remain the soul lighthouse For signalling terrestrial guests from Hades To the comfy curse of this Living Darkness The rigours of existential delirium Beyond repair, violating the virginity of our souls With a wrongful prescription, of the wrongest spermicide! Then close the pages I did, and searched for truth but to witness what available reality? an absolute wipe-out of the Neighbourhood and beyond

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS The wrongful spermicide – turned pandemic had ceased long to be a mere tendril of darkness but the long and forged malicious arm of death grabbing viciously at the world’s shirt front wringing out all life in long tendrils of darkness more full –blown cases, tenaciously clinging at the gift of life, with dead men’s cold-blooded claws seeking audience with fate, to propose a special reprieve these semi-guillotined men: Deadmen Walking

Felex Mafume-Mutasa

I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

The Best Things Come To Pass Who said so, that the best things Come to pass? best things? I used to think so To know so But today, I know better Everything of this world may come to pass But my love is forever it is an eternal flame I will never know if we ever guessed that we are two candidates to a destiny a destiny too sweet a destiny too real There’s beggary in the love that can be Reckoned Love is a poor one that can be Summed But why should I not say it…? My passions are made up of nothing But the finest part of pure love Just as always say dear love I would be able if I loved you less To talk about my love for you more One day this flower absorbs me A nice flower indeed the scent so succulent the colour so romantic But to a rude awakening my mental faculties are shaken Y’re the best colour Y’re the best available In scent In flavour

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS The foot tracks in the wild Savannah of My sincere love The source of my sincere love You make me see vision and hope Unique, like nothing else that I die for on Planet earth! Oh, too fond, my emotional outflow is Hence ended Yet the thick skin of my passion is only But prickled

Felix Mafume-Mutasa

I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

Shattered Dreams I am in trouble so bad with no future to look at no hope to cling Dream of heaven on earth Blown to the wind like dust I did not take my friend’s advice Taking myself to be a know-it-all Doing things which are noxious I would have not been in a state so Miserable… With dreams shattered And in trouble so bad Everything seemingly in golden platter With dreams to fulfil And hopes to satisfy It was a double blow And I am in trouble so bad With dreams shattered and smashed I am slowly go-go-ing… Slowly eating and eroding deep, deeper And deeper Goes the thing Beyond measure It sweeps deep And I am in trouble so bad I had dreams to satisfy To be safe and enjoy my youth But in a whisker, it was crushed. I was caught off foot In the blink of an eye I was in cloud nine of devastated and Devoured youth And I am in trouble so bad

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS Had I known that Hardy playboy I would have not reached a state so misearble Off guard, virginity was sucked out of me Like nectar from a sunflower and he with greatness of a he bee I was sucked dry and left wilting unlike a sunflower, I was left to die Not to die decently, but bitterly And shamefully with dreams shattered? and no hope, or horse to ride and in trouble so bad I am slo- wly d- ying because I was caught off foot lured by the decorated papers and The inns I was left for dead dreams shattered forever to die a bitter death I am in trouble so badly Oh you cousin Check your steps enjoy your youth and watch your steps lest your dreams will be thrown to the dogs and fall by the way pools keep cool and be your God And your dreams and hopes will fruit

Hardlife Upenyu Mudavanhu

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Akulasini I will not accept it, hayi mhan! I wont take that jazz from no one, Don’t think I can do it, ndinozvigona! And don’t think I’m blind, ngiyakubona! You treat me like I’m some kind of Dummy, My friend ungadlalisi ingqondo zami, You want to steal my pride, kundibira ini! Hazviite kani, it won’t do, akulasini! I’m not moved by your tears, chema Hako! How can you cry for chinhu chisiri chako? You murdered the very soul of my Ancestors, Now you burden my heart with Emotional blisters! Hear now the whisperings of their Angry voices, As they examine the facts and consider The choices, Uyezwa yini? its worse than hell Chiona manje, vana voita rebel! That tomorrow our people will cease to Suffer; We must fight, yes rebel, zvirinani kufa! Hayi ungangibambi, wena olandela Usathani, The victory is mine, akula mfo, Akulasini!

Fungai James Tichawangana

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Fractured Spirit Where are we heading? In this wilderness Where to be on the wrong side Of the political coin Is to swim in a pool Of scalding liquid steel What peace is this? In this Hararean iron jungle Where to live peacefully Is to erect a firm durawall? A stonewall of naked silence Whenever politics is a subject? Countrymen, My spirit is fractured I’m nine pregnant with disillusionment

Tirivacho Makwarimba

I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

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Why These Gaping Differences? I grew up in the security of your cream plastered promises I grew up in a protective fort of your flame lily promises Now, What rule is this? You settle your debts in cheques While I settle mine in coins In your barren Harare children battle with dogs Over morsels of sadza at the base of Streets bins While your belly sags and nods with over-eating Woe! I wish there were architects Of kind hearts: Their combined effort would save you

Tirivacho Makwarimba

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

To The Ashes Refused To Be Darkness floats Above the land Reality is lost Though hidden in The floating Darkness Still it is there Individually caged and in make-up Masked Which when washed The concealed being is seen Mist clothes feelings Though destroying not When this fear rules Tomorrow whether I will meet or follow to the pit those who cried to stifle the wailing of the land strangle to death Wax had no mercy In vain it tried Still the cry was there Cycloplegia handicapping eyes Though this fear ruled These feelings burnt not To the ashes refused to be

Willias Masocha

I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

The Alien There was a fence vision of pain Vision of survival and munching they had no partnership Belonged to different times and planets alien Willias Masocha At The Pigsty The farmer smiled it was a tooth or two to the soil The rest went did the termites nibble them where are their graves? I would have written an epitaph of teeth, flesh and bones he cut the piggling tails broke the teeth The sequel music to the ear perverted feelings survival ectomising parts directly not in words and song not with pen and paper the pigs squealed squealed and squealed mist in his hammocks Wax in his hammocks dun in his ears Dun in his nose and numb hands though they could break teeth And cut tails

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS mating at determined times had it been a bee organ exploding with violent obsession The farmer smiled a tooth or two what happened to my eyes?

Willias Masocha

I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

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What The World Badly Needs A little more kindness and little less greed a little more giving and less need A little more smile and a little less frown a little less kicking a man when he’s down a little more “we” and less ”I” a ittle more laughs and a little less cry a little more flowers on the pathway of life and fewer on graves at the end of strife

Abramiah Mponda

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

I Am The downtrodden of society an existing symbol of society’s oppression victim of parasites The repugnant, stinging, egocentricMosquitoes of society “I am”, the smallest fish in a pound squashed by a hierarchy of fat fish and alligators “for how long shall I stand aside and look?” I am the pebble swimming among rocks I was neither born to eat from society’s bins Nor to be clamped by its vices I am physically chained but mentally churned By pen I shall liberate myself, if not by Pain Even hard, “I “ will fight ahead to make It heard By any means necessary

Abramiah Mponda

I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

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Blues Linger than I can endure I will stand and listen To the sounds of morn birds Waking the world But never will they wake you my love Whence you had gone, you never will return Longer. Longer than I can endure I will stand and listen To the sounds of dusk birds To send the world to sleep But never more will I with you sleep my Love But in dreams we will be together Forever love

Anonymous

You Made Me So A hound of goodness I once was an advocate of peace a trustee of happiness and joy master of love carols preaching harmony and solidarity but no place is there for me, in this world over no place for peace, love or joy

Anonymous

The Epitaph Here lies a young man born during the hot days of the liberation struggle bred through tough decades of Droughts, completed school in the days of the economic structural adjustment issue and here he lies severed from us by AIDS

Panavanhu Mudavanhu

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

Betrayed No. 16 Revolution Drive P.O Zimbabwe Betrayed Nation One Day in 1996 Dear Smith You will forgive me for carrying that gun in 1966 it was just a compulsion of circumstances you see, sir, your forefathers took my land, my right to a living as you can see I had no choice I went to Mozambique, I somehow Survived the Nyadzonia massacres, but sir your Forces, Maiwee…, even Hitler would Have been proud We fought sir, sir we fought We lost limbs… But we had no choice In 1980 you lost the election and we all celebrated gladly we demobilised and waited waited sir for the land we fought for waited for the education of our kids We waited above all for the recognition We hoped to lie one day at the Heroes Acre We were wrong sir We heard that there were categories Good, better, best kind of thing My dear friend, a certain fellow was Buried in a fenced bush I heard Comrade Zongororo was buried In something that scarcely resembled a graveyard

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Yesterday at the offices they told me to produce documentary evidence to prove my history You yourself sir, you know we could not Afford to come up with registers and Stupas to join the struggle Sir, we have been betrayed, by our own we are destined for the dustbins of history It is not that I admire you, I mean you were the extension of Hitler, Hardcore Nazi but we are no different now, we are still the worst in society Sir do not reply, they will call me a traitor and I will disappear

EX-Combatant

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

Syllabus of Despair Just a good glance, my friend on the Hararean streets cinematic sights of children in tatters bright ideas buried in broken dreams sorrowful sights of sad citizens cringing carefully for survival blind beggars begging to live Just a good glance, my friend on the Hararean streets elegant and elephant fat ladies and gentlemen pass by if you are hit, they just run away in their fancy flashy cars who cares? The wretched victims sink In their shrines of ennui tomorrow is another nightmare to be greeted by the same syllabus the itching syllabus of despair Just a good glance, my friend on the Hararean streets the bath waters that were thrown away together with the baby disinherited by their leaders Yet endless summits steal the limelight suggesting robes of charity in declarations and edicts false Samaritan tears!

Mufaro Gunduza

I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

To You Yesterday’s Friend, Today’s Enemy The Savannah Sun baked us dry The tropical rain soaked us to the Marrow Talons of hunger caressed our intestines We shared the same cave with venomous Snakes And fought with baboons and monkeys For food You were our brother in those days Urging us on through thick and thin. We had an inspiration A ray of hope A cause to persevere The mosquitoes that sang incessantly on Our ears And with sharp stinging pain Drove their proboscis into our wizened skins The buckets that grazed us And blew our friends off Made us feel like sacrificial lambs For the salvation of the children of Israel and Egypt. I remember, former comrade, when you Stood before us Unleashing a barrage of insulting Epithets To the shameless ravenous wolves Who were tearing amongst themselves Our land, our minerals, our heritage Enemies wretching from us from our Gourd of milk and honey And above all, taking a whip to drive Us out From the house our fathers laboured to build for us I remember hearing you swearing

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS By the spirit of Chaminuka and Nehanda Vowing and taking an oath To drive away the shameless wolves So that we may regain our inheritance In short, trading against what you are Today.. Yes, we survived the bites of the the poisonous snakes a deluge of enemy’s bullets The threat of hungry lions and blows we could not dodge From hunger and diseases but not all of us did Blood flowed in Nyadzonia It scoured the earth into ravines in Tembwe Formed ponds in Gokwe and in Chimoio multilated bodies floated in rivers of blood. We fought, we persevered and that did it we regained our heritage and freedom amidst tears of happiness and sorrow we celebrated as we saw a new sun bright and promising it rose with a new magnificent, laden with future promises Promises of an abundant life full of Luxuries and fooled Amidst celebrations we elected you our leader to administer our inheritence and to share it equally among the heir-apparents Now after so many dark years of futile promises we see in you your yesterday’s enemy incarnate we watch you and your accomplices grabbing more and more for yourselves we see the Mobutu syndrome in you

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the Smith virus bleeding abundantly in you we wonder whether the time is not yet ripe to destroy the Vasco Da Gama disease in you to kick you out for you have taken enough for even the blind owner to see what the people of your kind suffered Is what we will make you suffer Tomorrow

Isaac Mthethwa

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

The Fat Cats Like ticks on cows backs they multiply Like destitutes they scramble for my Share In my name they fly to conferences In my name they fly to seminars Yes, in my name they organise festivals For it’s in my status they found liberty. Hey you fat cats Fat cats Enough is enough I am beginning to smell a rat For I am a disadvantaged rat I speak for disadvantaged rats Not you! I say you fat cat Your talking for me has been unfair Your talking for my colleagues is Suspect In your arrogance you call me a victim At an overseas seminary you purported To be defending me Yet back home I am not known Yet back home I am hungry Yet back home you fill your tummy with My share. No! No! let me say No! No more passing policies for me Without me No more talking for me without me Enough is enough Fat Cat You have done more harm than good.

Elliot Magunje

Resilience of Roots Such strange ridiculousness in the life of leaves in me evokes a soft awakening; caressing the dark corners of my mind with razor-sharp awareness! They bud and sprout and bloom and Set the world aglow Then to wither and to the ground to retire To the roots. We are leaves drooping to identify with Roots which we never see till like leaves We all fall down and disappear into the Ground of death and discovery. Though we know where we belong We no longer know how to belong Like leaves, we want to reveal in the warmth Of our independence and heritage visibly without Anxiety and despondency- but the elements? Like leaves casting off one by one We are left drooping to our roots In disconcerting sparseness. We look down and we know, for we are happy to belong But it is the rigors of existence The harsh and the rude realities Ever exposed like leaves, to terrors of patriotism The elements; wind sun rain-vagaries of weather Coming with a foreign culture Wearing out our resilience Squashing us in our own existence happily Inhaling the moribund fumes of cultural Disintergration yet we still long to be resilient. We may flourish in the blaze of worldly glamour Yet heavy to the souls is the weight Of identity frustration

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS But only in times of trouble, trouble which we care Ever in the end of an old existence lost in a new Beginning the relegated details of Old Roots yelling For recognition An eyesore, a cultural pimple on tomorrow’s baby faceIs our conscience bleeding- scars watering Great Zimbabwe, Or oozing crocodile tears from heads drooping in remonstrance, Excluding no bold possibilities of reunion with roots Fatally failed? But hey- our sense of belonging is Strong yet our delicate noses of cultural search refuse to smell the priceless and mystic Lotion of a trapped culture. Whole power still holds conscience with a hand miserable Yet resilient. Conscience! This euphemismWhit skulls looking upwards through six Feet of dust.

Felex Mafumbe Mutasa

I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

Heroes Acre At the door steps of our consciousness Is the heroes Acre of national ambitions Behold the bleeding skeleton of national dreams We sought the settler by night We fought the settler by day At daggers drawn encounter We ran roughshod over him. We were comrades in arms, brother, We were cadres in combat. The belt of revolution around us The call of resistance about us Brother we fought! Before you became god, brother, In love, in one heart, brother We hated the enemy Before you became boss Before you became chef. At Chikurubi, at Gonakudzingwa In Lusaka, in chimoio and Nyadzonia Brother, together, we endured! Now I feel the hot kiss of experience By this bleeding coffin of my hoped In the desert of promises of prosperity Am’ citizen in the avenues of poverty I tour the streets of suffering Sealed out of the metal envelop of national memory My poor health and my poor wealth My own scars are life’s vote of no confidence Rude reality’s karate kicks Am’ the product of a political abortion. You, brother, at the pinnacle of wealth and privilege You bite the big slice of opportunity, You butter it with luxury and surplus Swimming in the proud pools of comfort

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS While I drown in the sewage of sorrow You dress like a Christmas tree While am covered in canvas! You sleep in the plush of artificial heavens While where the night finds me is where I sleep. From the gutter of the ghetto, Through the curtains of fear I see your status, I hear your sirens My brave brain sentenced to insanity All my wishes exiled to hell! still am a tramp, I am a squatter in the lands for which I fought In the lands for which I bled for how long brother, will I be a scavenger, a scavenger from bin of Your greed! Yet am’ the blood that bought liberty. Visit my shack, not my grave at heroes acre Build me a house, not a grave at heroes acre celebrate my life, not my death at heroes acre Give me a car, not a hearse to Heroes acre Under the flag of Ascot freedom of fears and tears I am still licking the sweat of Liberation labours labours unrewarded! Waiting for independence from independence. For an experience not on occasion oh heroes acre of our ambitions The grave of our great expectations.

Jethro William Mpofu

I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

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O Mother O mother If I had a choice If it was possible If my wish could be I’d stop travelling This stumbling block and misty filled journey To the year 2000 Because 2000’s harsh and ‘ll wry her face at me Bequeathing me Klilly-nilly with 2000 problems Tow thousand! I’d rather sprint back To that carefree Blessed year I was born because there’s milk Warm and nourishing From the perennial fountain Of your breast The milk I was wont to drink Under the floodlights of your smile Reposing peacefully In the lukewarm cotton-soft

Raymond Nyapokoto

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

Squashed in My Disintegration Whenever I raise my mind’s eye To look up at the ceiling of my mind I come to a rude awakening The cracking roof my mind is hideous And through crack I see the sky Which my mental faculties Want to believe is heaven Damn is- blood dripping from the slay of hope? Trickling into my eyes. Visions I blink hard, And- what a sight! I am the fly of my existence squashed Dashed as the wall of intimate realities Has prized open the unguarded cracks of My soul The enemy with proboscis, has begun to such The marrow of my being drinking Drawing deep into the lungs the intoxicating fumes Of my disintegration. My mind has been stinging with a thousand swasps Of thought But whose ear would hear my silent voice When I am made to smash up my words Effectively crunching all essence Which might be lying in ambush And every illusion Is rattling the tin roof of my memories Of the ultimate realities of life

Felex Mafume-Mutasa

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Me and Them I have no mouth for their slogans, No stomach for propaganda porridge, No nose for their fried faeces, I will not ride their cheating chariots I will not bite their bait In my black brain, I have kicks and curses No kisses and kindnesses There is salt in my green blood Sweetest poison in the political cup I will not sing songs I did not compose I will not pay debts I do not owe Why apologise for what I did not do. I see politics private ports, In my mental telescope All is sick and insane I refuse to live I refuse to die I will exist It’s just me and them In revolution.

Jethrow William Mpofu

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

Letter to God This is to you father of creation Owner of all existence and the instrument of morality To the children of the fatherland, I will sing no song. I will recite no poem But, I will read, this, a letter A letter to god From a concerned citizen of planet earth Dear God Father of creation, are you watching this? To live is now but to die The journey from birth to death Is now but a funeral procession The world is now but a deathbed Graves and houses for space compete Hearses out-number taxes Mortuaries overload like the chariots of Babylon Cemeteries fill like rural latrines Mourning songs are now but daily anthems Hell has colonised planet earth, oh God, Cant heavens intervene? See the rivers of our tears As humanity is swept from the earth’s floor Why Father of creation Do you let the devil bath, bath in the tears Tears of your children? Father of creation, Should the world die young? Speak to us father of father From the bearded forest of your wisdom From the dump acres of the father land With erect bodies, we are listening Tell us what to do, Speak to us father of creation,

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The children are crying They are weeping and wailing Citizens of planet earth, natives of the universe Children of mother nature In one song and in one soul Rally behind the gods Against this enemy of creation This opponent of nature :AIDS: With slogans of chastity with wit and wisdom with care and caution

Jethro William Mpofu

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

To My Sunshine This is to you alone my sunshine You the sun that lights the darkness of my life In all the chambers of my heart Is a vacancy for none but you You alone is the citizen, the legal citizen Of the world in my heart You alone is the native, the permanent native Of the country in my head. I always watch you my sunshine In the movie of my memories I always see you my sunshine In the film of my imagination Again and again my sunshine I see you, in the mini-series of my thoughts You are a main character in the drama, The drama of my dreams my sunshine. It is miles and mountains of distance That sentence us apart my sunshine But gallons and gallons of desire keep us one Bucketfuls and bucketfuls of tears of my love, Tears of love, of painful longing for you. rain down my cheeks. come to me my sunshine, come to me, and be close to me When the world has gone to bed Come to me in the green grass And we will each to each sing songs of love In gentle soothing tones of love Come to me my sunshine, when the birds have gone to sleep Come and be close to me.

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I have never drank, my sunshine, from the river of things unknown I have never drank, my sunshine, of waters of wisdom I know nothing my love Except to love you, to love you And to love you again. come to me, my sunshine, and be Close to me come to me and speak in happy whispers. if to love you is to defy ordinances let me stand accused, even behind the bars of iron. Even behind the boulders of rock I will be forever loving you Come to me, my sunshine, and be close to me. Search therefore my sunshine search all the corridors, all the corners the streets and avenues of your heart and find a place for me, a Place for me, a heaven for my Heart, come to me, my sunshine and be close to me This, my sunshine, is not a letter this, my sunshine, is not a poem It is a document communicating feelings It is the product of my heart Do not read it my sunshine, but feel it It is the short story of my long love Seal it in the envelop of your memory And know that I LOVE YOU Come to me, my sunshine, and be close to me.

Jethro William Mpofu

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I AM IN TROUBLE SO BAD AND OTHER POEMS

My Private Anthem This is a tribute to nobody, To Mau Mau Kimathi and Kenyathi To Luther and X This tribute to everybody To you who cry, to you who bleed To Haile Selassie To Biko and Moloise To Hector Peterson And the unknown soldier! To those who died To those who disappeared Bearing badges of their beliefs To Fidel Castro, to Mau Mau Gaddaffi And the lion children The disciples of truth This is my private anthem, I am an uncensored version of a violent movie This is my private anthem, I am the active volcano gods had bribed but soon I will erupt….. and burn them alive, those who persecute us Those who haunt us this is my private anthem. to you who oppress us you who kills here we come I am the big bad eye that has sent the grin behind your smile soon I will fire electric wink Of:Revolution I am the big nose, that has smelt the dust below your carpet soon I will sneeze out the cleansing mucus

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of: Reaction I am the talented tongue, that has tasted the bitter poison in your sweet sugar soon I will spit the Hot saliva of: Demonstration I am the big lip that has felt The curse behind your kiss I am the loud mouth that will Preach the poetic truth of: Rebellion I am the bad ear that has heard we talk tonight of those who sentence us to permanent poverty, tonight we not in whispers but in slogans You see them, a man smiling his whole body a big smile while we Cry tears of blood while we chew our tongues in hunger But tonight we talk

Jethro W. Mpofu