Maseru Man

I'll be your life when spring arrives.
I'll want to touch your black face again, see
your arms hoist work onto the belt like a behemoth
tossing things out of this world.

Our thoughts will meet in the middle, melt.
And we shall go to Kingsway where men smell
of soap and honey, and mothers sell fruit,

a spring in our heel and love on our mind, now that
centuries have lashed us with their tongue, the moon
a cool, waste of sand, street-lamps hanging
like heads in shame at the mention of your name
(I, too, have wondered why the moon, after studying
the world for so long, is not yet tear-shaped).

You are the spark that fired us from the coals of Grootvlei
into this season. You are glisten. Month after month
on our way to work we hear words of mouths,
we lunch on benches where the sun has banned our games,
sip warm Sparletta, laugh at worn jokes.

Your panga splits yam like a head, spills
swastikas of broken butterflies no sleep can remove,
nor cold from the land of night,
nor words that bane our thoughts.

Whether or not anyone reckons we're good, our mountain
centres, the commitment, a myriad feelings in it unsaid.

If there's a god looking it's awfully quiet. If anyone cares.
I watch you throw like a fleeing slave your rucksack
onto the train and dive. We meet in the middle.