HALF-CASTE(by John Agard)

Excuse me
standing on one leg
I'm half-caste

Explain yuself
wha yu mean
when yu say half-caste
yu mean when picasso
mix red an green
is a half-caste canvas/
explain yuself
wha yu mean
when yu say half-caste
yu mean when light an shadow
mix in de sky
is a half-caste weather/
well in dat case
england weather
nearly always half-caste
in fact some o dem cloud
half-caste till dem overcast
so spiteful dem dont want de sun pass
ah rass/
explain yuself
wha yu mean
when yu say half-caste
yu mean tchaikovsky
sit down at dah piano
an mix a black key
wid a white key
is a half-caste symphony/

Explain yuself
wha yu mean
Ah listening to yu wid de keen
half of mih ear
Ah lookin at yu wid de keen
half of mih eye
and when I'm introduced to yu
I'm sure you'll
understand
why I offer yu half-a-hand
an when I sleep at night
I close half-a-eye
consequently when I dream
I dream half-a-dream
an when moon begin to glow
I half-caste human being
cast half-a-shadow
but yu must come back tomorrow
wid de whole of yu eye
an de whole of yu ear
an de whole of yu mind

an I will tell yu
de other half
of my story
© John Agard


Thanks to Signifying Guyana, I've just recently learned of John Agard and his powerful poetry. Half-Caste has been on my mind ever since I read it for the first time. Then I discovered that the real treat was in fact hearing Mr Agard read the poem.

It's a magnificent piece of work, standing there waiting to be read. But you simply have to hear him read it, or risk losing much of the magic!

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Happy Birthday, Derek Walcott!

The poet and playwright Derek Walcott was born and raised in St Lucia. His work has been described as an evolving conversation with his birthplace.

In Omeros, his adaptation of the Illiad, he centres on the rivalry between Achilles and Hector, who are portrayed as two St Lucian fishermen. 

He maintains a presence on the island, though he lives in America, where he has been a visiting professor at Boston University since 1985. 

He won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1992 and will be in Trinidad this summer to collect another award. Derek Walcott is 79 today.
[source...]

Derek Walcott Reads

Derek Walcott Reads. The Classics can Console/But Not Enough

Ode to a Shot

The muscle pulls the arm back,
bracing the hand that will catapult
and oust the ball from its hollow,
like a tilted rocker released. The ball
loops across the sky like a sun whose parabola
we follow into the hoop's horizon, an egg
thrust into its nest yet never dying
in its yellowness but rebounding in spirit,
hatching genitals, sprouting one, two legs;
popping eyes that look at the world it's in,
clinging onto Atlas's neck whom Zeus
entrusted with the grief of carrying us,
like a tree feeds the fruit it bears, or a tee
holds the roundness of a golf ball,
or clavicles the spine which holds the skull
by the scruff of its neck, bony fingers
wielding the head like an athlete's trophy
to the world. And so we're loved: from
tingling spine to knowing in our hearts
that no gold, frankincense or myrrh
can dull what beauty god has put there.
__________


Happy 2011 everyone. I truly hope for better things for the world and for everyone of us. Well, most of us. There will always be a catastrophe here and there, natural or man-induced. A dictator or two. El Ninyo or something else. What we need is better health, we need justice and equal rights, and we need a healthier planet. Some of us got kids, for crying out loud. And we need jobs.

Most of 2010 saw me rewriting and revising. How do you write a poem? I know there's no deliberate answer to that. What I want to find out is how I, Rethabile, can write a poem, because I suspect that in the end, the process or approach is different for everyone, once the common, indispensable elements have been satisfied.

That year also took away one of my parents. I'm grateful for the show of sympathy here, everywhere and at home from many of you. It does make the blow softer. I'm grateful to the many Basotho who helped with preparations and patted us on the back, and listened to us complain, or heap praise on our late father.

Now the future is here, a big step is behind us. I do not see what else I can or must do except continue to work for bacon as much as before, but also, to revise and rewrite, and write, full-stop. I have a manuscript in my pocket that is destined for the press this year or the next. The urgency of wanting to put out a book at all costs has waned. The urgency now is on writing that poem, and writing with all my might and with all my love. The book will publish itself.

I'm happy to have all of you out there as companions on this arduous road. I'm glad for your generosity and the ease with which you share. May 2011 bring you lots more from where that very spirit came from.