Detangling

Sandisiwe Eletu Yengeni

Sibabalwe Siphelele Dimaza

DETANGLING

THE THESIS Detangling is a concept we know all too well as black women. We are an embodiment of the many knots we carry. And so we have become familiar with learning how to detangle them. Constantly working to undo them. We know that it means to take the time to choose the right concoction for your hair type. Taking the time to patiently work through every knot. The pain of a popping and crackling comb. The cold relief of a vapoured shampoo. The smooth sensation of a rich, buttery moisturizer. Being careful not to allow too much breakage in the process, we become masters at this tenderness.

Like this concept of detangling, our experiences, are deeply knotted. We carry with us various experiences mountaining a lifetime, that heap and mesh into new knots which require effort to come undone. Therefore, we, all of us, require the same precision, patience and time to pull our knots apart until we become free from their hold on us.

May God help you detangle well.

Shampooing

Samdisiwe Yengeni

TEACHING MYSELF HOW TO MOURN Children of absent fathers walk around with empty baskets in their hearts, waiting for anything that resembles love to fill them up.

A lesson in love: Your eyes are kind and beckoning, you must be a version of love.

You are present.

Here.

This is more than I've ever known, therefore you are more than enough.

And yet...

I woke up to your half-baked presence, swallowed my questions and would not let the vomit of my grumblings come out.

You are here.

That is more than I have ever known.

Daughters of absent fathers wear their feelings like oversized coats with deep pockets.

Can you not tell?

How I am able to hold your darkness without being consumed by it.

Oh darling, I have rinsed my soul in ink, drenched my heart in black so I am resident in the dark.

I have walked a mile without light. I've lived my share of suffering and hid it deep within these pockets.

These days, I cannot even tell where yours ends and mine begins.

Samdisiwe Yengeni

TEACHING MYSELF HOW TO MOURN Questions on love: Did you know, daughters of dead men - in whatever form death may come - look for faces that most resemble or least resemble their fathers.

They say: see, this is love. An antithesis of death.

This is presence, orbiting each other's existence though it choke the life out of me.

Holding on tight though I choke the life out of it.

Tata, ndinjenjenje nguwe.

Masirhaxe phantsi kwalamanzi sobabini.

Ngoba kaloku nguwe umenzi, ndim umgcini.

Sibabalwe Dimaza

EZEKIEL 37: OF BREATH AND BONES 1.I fell in love for the first time at the edge of a burgundy seat. You were not there. Only the crowd and their hands and a stage and words. The words of a man whose stubs You’d turned into legs in a matter of breath caught mine.

My whole life seemed a prelude - a pause for breath always meant to be borrowed from You. I closed my eyes and took You in. I learnt for the first time how it felt to breathe by the Book.

2.We’d fallen into a silent-servant-who’ll-write-a-page-but-never-raise-a-word-of-mouth kind of love.

I’m a bashful lady with nothing more than a writer’s willing hands. I’m better found making things out of moments so I made a home for you in what had become of my heart: A furnace, with only your name in the walls of its memory.

3.Death has a way of tapering the curtain from the blink of your eye; has a way of leaving a view that calluses your heart; has a way of drying up your bones and your throat and your mouth and your love, so Love, I can no longer sing of You when I’m alone, can no longer hold candles or burn sacrifices for You. The furnace has tapered, but I do remember You. Every day. I am neither brave nor daft enough to say You broke or put me out, but the writing is on the walls.

4.On the days that I think of You, I will always close my eyes and pray that you’ll breathe the death out of me.

Borrow me more than a moment on a burgundy seat, prepare a table for me and we will feast in the presence of death.

Samdisiwe Yengeni

DEATH POEM Fresh flowers are the bedding covers on the grave.

Draped in black from head to toe, this time you've outdone yourself in mourning. This is your moment.

And how could it not be?

Here lies all your effort; a summation of all you've done, all burnt to ash.

Inside the coffin you buried nothing. You merely thought the weight of something going into the ground felt poetic.

So you bought one and today, the devil can dance on the grave.

Here, the dreams do not cry for you.

Here, giving heart means nothing.

Here it all burns to the ground.

You watch the ivory tower tumble.

And now you're in mourning

Samdisiwe Yengeni

FOR THE TIME MY FAMILY SAVED MY LIFE Oh darling, when your life choices seem to sum up to nothingness, paling as mere shadows of your imagination, you cry in the dark to honour the dead. You tried to make something of yourself, didn't you? You gave and gave and gave, but God... ...

The living room, which currently serves as your room is dark. Power is gone again; damn you Eskom!

This time you do not light a candle. Instead, you put on your sad playlist and set the mood for another flood.

Today, you'll cry your demons out in peace, because no one can see your ritual.

You will allow the darkness to swallow you.

So you dance mad with your monsters, no longer able to fight. Tonight, yours is to surrender. ...

If I told you at 18 that you'd be broke, unemployed and hiding at your mother's house at 30 you would have laughed at the absurdity. Because you, you were special. A shining star destined to set the world alight. Instead, all you've managed is to set yourself ablaze. Oh darling, do not surrender to the fire inside threatening to finish you off. The world still needs burning. ...

Your latest rejection message reads "Sorry, but you are not what we are looking for. However, I think you are one of the brightest stars of our country, I cannot wait to see what you do".

You read the email, politely thank the director for the generous compliment and wish her well. Then you close your laptop and laugh out loud. How can you shine in this land that promises so much, tells you to pile up degrees and debt and then spits you out as nothing? How mocking is it for those who experience it differently to call you "a bright star"?!

You're not sure if your mouth tastes like iron or gull. You aren't laughing anymore instead you are enraged, because your family cannot eat bright stars or pretty papers from fancy schools that prove how brightly you can shine.

Love and light does not quell any of your hungers.

Samdisiwe Yengeni

FOR THE TIME MY FAMILY SAVED MY LIFE Jack's melodic voice on f-stop blues blurs the monstrous sounds coming out of your mouth.

You think to yourself that you wish you were as gutsy as Jacob. How you would wrestle God, maybe to the ground, then try to throw a punch and ask why he would afflict you so (I hope you blush and convulse at the blasphemy).

Or as surrendered as Paul, calling your problems "momentary afflictions".

Instead, you are you - whimpering lips and drooping arms under God's perfect will; so insecure in his love for you it stings.

Guilty at the thoughts, even guiltier that you have the audacity to write them out.

Forgive me Lord, for I have sinned. ...

Your family doesn't know that crying is your daily ritual. First, when you were sitting in the room pretending to apply for scholarships. Second, when you were in the kitchen making breakfast. Then when you were on the phone. And when the power went out. Then when you went under your covers pretending to be sleepy.

Your mother thinks you are happy, or something like that.

They don't notice that the light has left your eyes. You are a ghost walking about the mess of your days.

After every cry, you wash your face and shout a funny thing at your mother in the other room.

This helps, she doesn't notice your bloody eyes when you finally come out. ...

Your boyfriend's words are not always soothing, though well-meaning.

You struggle with this, how a person's words can be a basket - always ready to receive you yet so empty.

Or an ocean - calming and swallowing at the same time.

The air of all that is unsaid between you is thick. Today, the distance between you feels even longer.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

PRESENT IN ABSENCE I am not here.

Though parts and science argue contrary. I am not here.

Though my body, the full weight of me plays gravity with this bed and my eyes play freeze tag with the ceiling.

I.Am.Not.Here.

I am not here.

Let's forget the science, I am not here.

I cannot. I cannot..

Let the clock tick tock my days away.

Though I be here in form, with breath and dragged feet going about the mess of my days, I am not here.

There is a revolution of words in my room threatening to conquer my nights.

I'm comfortable under this regime, save for that stupid mirror which insists on reflecting my hollowness.

It mirrors my pretend- existence to reflect me back to my hollow self.

It dares to try nullify the words I fill my nights with and renders them void, as just puppets I use to make everyone believe that I am here. Mockingly names them things to pass time. Now there goes my nights too.

I am not here. Though my blinking eyes Judas, to prove me otherwise.

Otherwise, I am not here.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

PRESENT IN ABSENCE Bless the day when I stop playing make-believe.

Bless the day when I exist.

When I finally concur that which science has been barking at me..that I am here.

Conditioning

Sandisiwe Yengeni

AN AFTERLIFE: YOU LIVE IN MY MEMORIES I will not cry for you No tears can put together broken glass, Nothing can erase this pain that feels like my skin is being sandpapered, to erase even the slightest of your memory.

Almost as if to nullify your existence, or even worse, to reduce it to a few drops of that which will soon fade. To be forgotten.

I will not dignify pain with proving it right.

Because you were a beautiful song that tug on my heart strings, never to be forgotten.

Way more than that.

Often, your memory lands like sloppy kisses of sunshine on my face on stormy days to remind me that at the very least, you lived extravagantly.

Sometimes it carries me.

When simplicity escapes my mind, a thought of you reminds me how sometimes the most breathtaking things in life are the most simple.

Yet sometimes, it comes as a sharp pain that shoots through my heart like the first time I found out failure was an actual thing.

Or when they told me I would never see your face again.

Or that time they wouldn't let me see her, because the car that ran her over left her so badly disfigured that they thought if I looked at her, I wouldn't be able to recognise her even in my memories.

Sometimes I sit in the dark just so the outside matches that which is happening inside.

I miss you so.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

AN AFTERLIFE: YOU LIVE IN MY MEMORIES I know these words are not big enough to contain you. Because you, you were larger than life.

But sometimes, I imagine these letters as a boat that take you to all the places that you never got to see.

And in them, you sail to watch the moon in unknown skies.

While in them, you smell blue oceans and let new winds kiss your skin.

I imagine you happy.

I imagine you smiling and as you know, when you did I couldn't help but join in.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

DADDY WHY DID YOU LEAVE? Daddy why did you leave?

I promise I got them straight A's, I'd have made you proud.

Or were we too loud? I know two was company, now six has gotta be a crowd.

He plays soccer so well, you'd be so proud.

They are both well-behaved, you didn't have to give in to your doubt.

Or was she just not enough?

She wrote letters about you, said you were awesome too.

Maybe you should've tried.

I'll admit at some point, yes I cried.

I know we would've made you proud.

Now I can only wonder, since you're six feet under.

Detangling

Sibabalwe Dimaza

NO WAVE THING I am no wave thing I am no Moses basketed, noosed to the hip of an ocean, born to be carried away by the tide thing I'm not a thing that dips and dives and dies under this rubble and salt and sky, and under these sea-men, better sea-monsters who charter their unlicensed vessels on my intimate things.

With no caution or care they trail and leave their spills there, But i'm no wave thing I'm not a thing that whips and crashes at the break of the wind or the pull of the sky, not created for that cycle of fall and rise and fall and rise, where the depths and heights you reach don’t even move you don’t even change you no more or ever

Sibabalwe Dimaza

NO WAVE THING How you look like yesterday's tears and damp and fog and keep clinging to the dry and parched things.

How you baptise their bodies and mouths but get nothing more than yourself back in different form.

Cannot be that blind a thing, pushed to move nowhere and everywhere at the same time and back thing and blue thing and black to reflect the moods of the sky thing, a neat mess of a thing huddled to look the same as and cling to everything else you were created next to forever thing, void of choice, helpless, yet so full of strength and potential if you could escape thing inanimate and life at the same time thing, a slave of creation thing.

Just a wave thing.

I will never be just a wave thing.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

MAKE-BELIEVE He said: Let us hold hands and dance under this moon.

Let us romance, forget that we are mortal beings just these few moments.

Listen to the whispers in the wind, tonight it’s our orchestra.

Let us laugh till the stars envy our lustrous smiles.

He said let's make history.

Start our own rhythm and forget the blues.

Yes we have woes, but can we forget that we are clothed in fitted suits called skin for this one night?

Let's make room for our bones, even just a window for them to breathe.

Tonight, with the moon bracing us with its fullness, the sky is pulling all the stops in cheering on these glorious moments.

Let's pretend like these streets are our own, the mood is already set.

With street lights as our dim lights, let us slow dance.

With this night as our witness, let us make something beautiful, he said.

Only, he didn't...

Sandisiwe Yengeni

WHEN IN DOUBT Still my anxious heart.

This garden is yet to yield the roses it promised.

Like the eroding grass clinging fiercely to the ground, fighting to stay alive.

Breathe. Inhale once more, even with the sting.

Live. Take every stride life gives you as a lesson.

Pray. Ask the God you serve to make living worthwhile.

Mourn. Put on black for that girl you used to be.

Bury her. Then find joy in who you are now.

Look to the sky, allow your eyelids a moment to embrace their counterparts.

Pray. Ask the Lord to make living worthwhile.

Trimming split ends

Sandisiwe Yengeni

STARTLING MYSTERY...AFTER SHAI LINNE Somewhere along the way I met perfection.

He said to mimic him till I mirrored his reflection.

But like Eve, I let a serpent shift my perception.

Misconstruing the weight of my decisions, his life was the ultimate price for my transgressions.

Somewhere along the way I met the perfect addiction.

He swore he was better than any drug from any dealer. Better yet, if I let him he said he'd be my healer.

His gaze was fixed on his mission.

To his father he gave the ultimate submission.

He said the trick was love without restriction. Give up your resisting, that's how you learn submission.

He washed my feet.

Put on a crown of thorns to remove my life thorns.

This God I serve, he became a servant so I could learn the true meaning of service.

The cross was his crowning moment of service.

And for that I give him my life. A bride not deserving of the title 'your wife'.

And yet you say, even when I still rejected you, you were pursuing me.

You wanted me, the ultimate sinner as your wife.

Now that's what you call grace, the price for my salvation

Sandisiwe Yengeni

A PSALM INTERLUDE I will bless the one who knows my coming and going.

Though mourning lasts for the night, his joy cometh in the morning.

I will bless the redeemer who deemed me worthy of the title 'daughter'.

The Lord is good and his mercy endureth forever.

Yes, my lips will burst out in song and sing his name forever.

The Lord who chose me and called me by name before man even gave me a name.

He thought it pleasing to call out the gold in me, telling me the strength I possess was from him, the God in me.

My heart will sing to you my beloved. My knees will fall in surrender to you my beloved.

You crown my year with your goodness, call me your goddess.

I bless you creator of the universe.

The one who formed something-me, out of nothing.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

NOTE TO SELF Dear self, You are enough.

Your company is enough.

Your company is valid.

Remember that solitude does not mean isolation.

Silence does not mean absence.

Alone does not mean lonely.

You Yourself As you are Are enough

Sandisiwe Yengeni

UNLEARNING There is no honour in wearing yourself out in the name of "work".

That's a lie you need to unlearn.

The measure of effort is never how rundown you are.

Ever.

Twist outs

Sibabalwe Dimaza

?

Creator, make me a pen.

Point me in the right direction.

Write of me. Write fully. Write well.

Do not waste any words. Do not miss any letters.

Pause for breath before the next paragraph, then write "Selah".

Let the pauses linger if you must, but please don't lose your grip.

Make the pauses worthwhile.

Begin each chapter in bold.

Capitalise each start.

Make the font bigger in some parts.

Do not erase any errors.

Instead, draw a line through them. Begin again next to them.

Then write clearly.

Write freely. Write passionately. Write liberally Write deliberately. Write repeatedly.

In the end, bring the words closer.

Let them weed form you imagined.

Then sign the bottom.

Write "Selah." Write "It is done."

Sandisiwe Yengeni

HANDS Palms, engraved by suffering.

Blood-sweat and tears carried through my palm lines.

Telling tales not of fairytales but of struggles.

Of poverty. Of pride. Of guilt. Of a fatherless child.

These hands, they carry history.

Generational turmoil.

They carry proud Xhosa roots.

Ezama qhawe nama qhawekazi awayedibanisa amathe nenyembezi so they could pass forward the names they bore so proudly.

Ndizokwazi ukuzingca ndithi ndisisizukulwana saMaMvulane, ooNcilashe.

These hands they've breathed, lived poverty. Their scars narrate life in the township.

Tiny hands carrying beer bottles for oMalume who drank too much.

Elokshini, where broken dreams are the melodies playing across the streets, regrets are drowned in cartons zamajuba.

The night is brought to a standstill as it listens to the stories shared between crates of empty bottles, until dawn creeps in to mimic yesterday's cycle.

These palms hide secrets of whispered words between lovers.

The kinds of secrets that would never dare be shared out loud.

Sweaty palms exchanging glances, gossiping of heartache. Of words unsaid. Heard only by these palms.

Hands.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

HANDS Hands with multiple vocal cords.

Fingers that hold the pen as though it’s a mighty sword used to pierce through silence Fists that roll as thundering clouds threatening to violently erupt A thumb solo for a greeting. A perfectly pitched duet of peace signs. A choir that can high five in harmony, to express loudly that which lips cannot utter.

Hands so beautiful and sensual. Feminine hands.

Tender, manicured hands. Polished hands.

These hands are of a woman.

A proud woman. A Xhosa woman.

One who carries bravery through her veins.

Taught to cherish every breath as a gift.

Taught by those brave women around her how to flourish in a world where women sit with their heads down, withering inside as they perish.

Hands, raised in worship to the Lord.

Nothing beheld in these hands but they themselves become the offering.

These hands, they've seen much. They've touched much. They've heard way too much.

Yet these hands, they stand upright like soldiers in surrender to God the Great Major.

These imperfect hands become the spotless lamb.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

HANDS So I will give these hands as a living sacrifice.

Holy and pleasing, to be of service to others.

To catch the tears from my brother's eye.

To speak volumes where others are overcome by silence.

To give a hug, a handshake or wave where it's required.

These hands will make history in serving others.

I will fulfil my calling to be God's hands with these flawed hands.

Because though I may not have been born with much, God gave me HANDS..

Styling

Sandisiwe Yengeni

1 CORITHIANS 13 When I say I love you, I mean to put words to sight.

To make concession to behold stained glass.

To failte imperfection.

To say, this love has enough room for complicated, and deficient and exasperating and proceeding.

To love is to hanker to behold the culmination of this, our sanctification.

And in the already and not yet, to choose all that you are; making a lifetime of room to welcome it.

Continually beholding the beauty that is, and has been, and is to come.

"I love you" is a pact with my future self.

A valorous effort at piercing the veil between then and now.

Crossing the gully to and fro, to return with a promissory note of my future presence.

Sibabalwe Dimaza

FLIGHT I hold you.

You are tender, tentative, trembling- a thing of beauty in the palm of my pen.

Exhausted from flight, you lie in perfect trust here.

Your breath is still, mine is held.

It takes you in.

Your heart is a cathedral of all I’ve needed in oblivion, the kind of holy my hands hold only to break.

I am human.

My members are manned.

They know only the chase for things, even after they’ve found them.

They are of effort and proof, of reason and time, they know better than to count on anything other than themselves.

They will not hold on long enough for this love.

I’m afraid it’s been a minute of you and a lifetime of my heart a black cavern of half-truths and blue lies.

It has been turned hollow by evasion, a grid of tears lines the insides, a reflection of your kind in the eye of its memory.

Sibabalwe Dimaza

FLIGHT It is empty and oddly heavy at the same time.

You’re breathing still, each breath is a stub of lead anchored in my chest, a cog-wheel, rolling a heart-beat and a breath out of me.

I’ve held it as long as I could.

I breathe you awake.

Your eyes are raw and red and longing.

Your heart rushes at the heat of my humanity Aware, I suppose of how easily it lets me breaks things.

Its been a minute of you.

Now a looming memory Exhausted, you return to flight.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

MHLA SIWELELA KWELOLIZWE ZUKHUMBULE OKU/ 5 ANECDOTES OF LOVE 1. To you, “let’s move in together” is an unknown declaration of love. Unknown, to the other party that is.

A statement of faith to jump head first, both sweaty palms and bright-eyed wonder into the abyss, trusting to happen upon that which is glorious. Or it is to say, here, this is the passage way to my heart. Come sit with me here, take your shoes off and be comfortable because though you don’t know it yet, this will be home. So find your way to settle in.

2. Growing up, my mother was obsessed with having "good girls" around me. She would say: Siwe, itshomi ziyakhethwa.

Ungaziboni sewuxakene nabantu kula hostel ke. A coded way of saying: if you get out of pocket or come back with uncanny habits or worse, pregnant (cough), hmmm uzondazi. Now, coloured in and calloused by life, I think that love sometimes is represented in that sentiment.

Uzondazi is another way of saying: darling, I want all that is good and nourishing to water you tall. For your best parts to bubble and boil and brim to surface, till they spill over. I want depth in love, wealth in friendship, an ocean of all that is infinite and yes in this lifetime. This imperfect love will present you as both firm hands and steady knees, so do not grasp for the vapouring substitutes.

Granted, it is a declaration of love enveloped in fear. I guess love is like that sometimes; armoured by our defences, it doesn’t always come out just right. When I met you, or you met me, whichever came first my stats friend, I didn’t know that you were the heads to the tail of my mother’s“uzondazi”. An ocean of love, so deep and consuming sometimes I fear it might drown us both.

Or has - in debt, and recklessness and bad decisions…and sisterhood.

An “in spite of”, “always and forever”, “yiza wethu”, “lady”, “the Yen”, “beloved”. Across seasons and the ocean. An “I would fly anywhere if you needed me”.

That which covers a multitude of sins.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

MHLA SIWELELA KWELOLIZWE ZUKHUMBULE OKU/ 5 ANECDOTES OF LOVE 3. A lesson on love: Learning to hold hands when the idea of sweat and physical contact sends shivers down your spine Learning to say, “it hurts”, cross legged, hands locked parallel when you’ve mbokodo’d your way through life A lesson on compromise: yes, I suck at texting and you hate it. But if you need me, send me an “I need you” text so I know to get over myself... and middle seats on long flights are a shared load Learning to decipher the coded language between two conflict avoidants: I am sad, I don't like you very much right now, that hurt. A reckless abandonment without shame, anchored on a love secure. Coming to this sanctuary just as we are Learning how to speak: the parts said out loud “you will need to teach my boyfriend how to gift me the best gifts”, “I love you”. The parts whispered “here, where my heart meets yours and our minds adventure wherever they find a forest, you can relax. You have a home with me” Learning to laugh out loud: we are in our shared living room, our excitement extinguishing any shivers from wrestling the cold on our unenviable trek to our uphill apartment. You, hands on my waist, is it Tekno or Burna or Wizkid backup singing to your commands being barked at me to stop being so "stiff" and to shake my waist sexy? I still can't distinguish between them afrobeat boys

Sandisiwe Yengeni

MHLA SIWELELA KWELOLIZWE ZUKHUMBULE OKU/ 5 ANECDOTES OF LOVE 4. The parts of you unknown are unmoored. Your breath both slinking stillness and roaring ocean all at the same time, signals at once that you are still here. Your hearty laugh and lustrous smile. A forever optimist. With phrases like “don’t you sometimes marvel at the vastness of the ocean” or “do you look at the sky and feel overwhelmed at our capacity to behold all it contains and to exist within it? Do you think it is a synonym for our capacity to love?”

I look at you, a mixture of bewilderment and an intense eye-roll. This is corny, I think.

My poorest and least forgivable assessment to date. You have proven me a poor judge at best, a liar at worst.

For you are the first visible sign of a lighthouse in an ocean riddled with storms that threaten to capsize us. Textured by life yet unjaded. Stars hanging in all right places, so full of light. A beam radiating wonder unlost.

A thread through the history of Toni and Baldwin and Maya and Tsitsi and Zade.

Nina Simone’s invisible lyrical breath in “Young, Gifted and Black”.

Zora Howard in a Harlem jazz bar bolting out “Sister girlfriend”.

An unbounced courage cheque that Koleka Putuma keeps threatening we owe to our dreams.

The guitar strum in Pip Millet’s ‘Ava’.

Sleeping at Last hushing the ocean behind us.

Pedestaling beauty and wonder in the face of death and decay.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

MHLA SIWELELA KWELOLIZWE ZUKHUMBULE OKU/ 5 ANECDOTES OF LOVE 5. Speaking of decay, past a certain age our bodies start to betray us, no matter the pruning and prudence of care. A cruel and constant reminder of death, our ever-present nemesis. Yet this life given, though singular and seemingly short is a constant reminder that we are still here. It signals another opportunity to shake your waist in some dingy bar somewhere in the world, or a moment to sit in a cabin crackling with laughter, a fire of youth burning deep within to warm us through the night. Or is it the wine we’re drinking. I can never quite tell where the passion ends and the wine begins in all our debates.

Anyway, what does it matter. It beckons us to write books and papers to seriously reckon with the purpose of being.

Or to go home to our humble yet nourishing nest, birds who know to always return when the sky turns dark because of the clouds pregnant with rainfall.

To host poetry and champagne gatherings, gathering randoms who might one day call each other friend, or in my case, to just add to the list of your friends you claim I dislike.

It is an invitation to exist still.

To laugh heartily and smile lustrously still.

To be forever optimists with phrases like: Yes, the sky's capacity to hold all it contains is a synonym for our capacity to love.

To marvel at the vastness of the ocean and to be here, in complete surrender, blessing the moment.

Today, I hope we all take it, even for the days when we don’t.

Sibabalwe Dimaza

?

You and me, my Word Look what we've built here...

I have found community in this silence.

This, my sacred solitude; This, my tarpaulin tent; my bullpen that I've severed silently with soft-spoken Truths.

I've penned a kind of home here.

Pieced together the mortar word for Word; Forged my foundation from lessons laced in tragedy; Gathered the groundwork from revelations Time's unveiled to me; Yarned the veils from fragments of History.

Though yet not fully fledged, this city of me has seen some things baby.

Sibabalwe Dimaza

?

Vile, unbecoming roaches of tyrannies have straightened early this spine of me.

Devil days of hurt once dragged me to my dregs; once hurled the life & hope out of these streets of me; once held me hostage with fiery furnaces of feelings better expressed in sobs and silence.

I've beheld some things baby.

Borne the birth of carcasses of dreams baby.

Pangs of pain once drilled holes in these walls of me; cracked open the dainty parts of my childlike self; twinged and tweaked my days into lonely grays.

I've been to some places baby.

But these Words, they've saved me.

Hooked my hurts into frequencies of Glory; wrapped my pain into ribbons of rhythm housed in this pen of me; laced my lonelies into lyrics written to Christ in me; forged holy matrimony of me in History-His-Story; breathed all my broken into life for me.

Sibabalwe Dimaza

?

These Words be my rhythm when life is out of sync with its promises; They be my advocate when shadows of darkness have me still and silent; They be blue-light revelations of God when morning cracks; They be my living claimed back from mere existence.

These Words they be my witness that God is here in spite of distance.

They be childlike faith that was never forced to grow up.

They be Spirit in Voice, they speak for me when i cannot speak of myself.

These Words they be my peace, piecing together a commission of Christ in me.

These Words have found camp in this vessel of me.

They are the Truth He's shaped into Life for me.

These Words are my beginning I am the manifestation of Spoken Word-Words spoken at the genesis.

These Words are my ending.

These Words, they're my guide Home.

You, my Word Look what you've built of me.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

SONNET 43 How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

I love thee from the genesis.

Blessed was our encounter. Sovereignty spoke and we had no choice but to listen.

Our bodies, seemingly understanding the magnitude of the moment, locked hands and lips became the seal.

Though marred by sin and self, I am all the better for it.

I love thee in the process.

This friendship, so anchoring in the tussle of blooming and cacooning and laughter and hurt and distance and time and chance. We knew not what we were given but you were smart enough not to taint it.

Then love arrived. And grew. And grows.

You, the captain of our ship treaded these uncharted seas with the utmost care.

A tenderness that protects yet prunes.

We knew to try and try we still.

Thank you for being intentional then and now.

Still steady at the wheel, with many waves and storms we've passed and mannier ahead, our ship has a glut of seas to chart yet still.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

SONNET 43 I love thee in the turbulence, as we hold each other's hands firm.

I love thee when hurt and pride and self stand in the way, yearning to yield to meekness.

I love thee in the misapprehensions. A thing of treasure, you are worth every frustrating conversation.

I love thee in the shallow. When beauty is the standard, you win every olympic.

I love thee in the stillness, when words cannot suffice. A look, a touch, a note are but a few of the supplements.

I love thee deliberately. A choosing on the daily. I love thee in the becoming.

I love thee in the forward. A thing of hope, I shall love thee better then.

I love thee more than I did then, a now greater than yesteryear.

The future shines all the brighter with the thought of you in it. What bliss, that fuels my love all the more.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

TABILE MEANS JOY. LERATO MEANS LOVE My cousin is long legs, loud mouth and shrugged shoulders. I have been wondering when she became this nonchalant.

Now I'm convinced that sometimes, pain frees you. It plays Harriet Tubman, unshackling you from "should be's".

Brings urgency to the immediate. Places your feet firmly on the "now".

Makes reckless abandon not a luxury but survival.

A die cast by life and you be the chosen. So what can you do but walk in your providence?

My cousin is home - a full embodiment of umXhosa: Carefree black girl with a voice that announces her arrival before the face ever emerges.

She is thick braids and wide hips. A rare beauty, Naomi Campbelling her way through them small town streets.

Her ocean breeze laugh leaves no trail of apologies for them stubborn genes.

Because with my people, nothing is ever done in half-measure.

She be short with them silly boys, and patient with our silly brothers.

Small town girl with big city dreams.

Putting youthful whims and rights of passage on hold to put bread on the table.

Our chance-appointed representative, moonlighting as a peer to the adults during tough times.

Her self-appointment speech announcing her graduation to the big leagues read as follows: "hi makazi, umama akazukwazi ukuza kulom'cimbi ngenxa yengulo. Kodwa xa kukho into emfunayo, nindibize mna ndizom'mela".

And with that, my girl knew she'd arrived.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

TABILE MEANS JOY. LERATO MEANS LOVE I ask her how she carries it so well, she tells me you just put one foot in front of the other and choose joy always mntase. And any little money you have, na enjoyment. Well...after, saving for rent, bailing out rents, buying them bread, bailing out siblings, using any rills for family bills.

My cousin is the whistling kettle on a cold morning - a welcome announcement of the warmth to come.

Tall girl in high heels, strutting around with no damn care. Towering lights like the Burj Khalifa.

Miss Icwili who dared the runway even when she couldn't walk right.

And isn't that who you are though, big girl?

Jumping first and thinking later when it comes to facing fears.

And now, gracefully making your body home to those dimpled thighs kissing beneath them short skirts, our family heirloom.

The Gordon Ramsay of potato salad, showing us off at family events.

Walking in purpose and joy without all the theorising.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

TABILE MEANS JOY. LERATO MEANS LOVE Tabile means joy. Lerato means love.

You are such a joy to love.

Your love brings us joy.

Your joy helps us love.

May you always find joy in how you love.

And how you are loved.

May you love the joy you keep choosing.

And choose spaces that keep giving.

May you always choose joy even when labouring in love.

And make joy your wages for the labour of love.

Re thabile ka lerato la hao.

Tabile means joy. Lerato means love.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

SPRING Oh darling, My cheeks have basked in the sunshine of your kisses Do you know all our secrets lay hidden under my tongue?

Sandisiwe Yengeni

AN ODE TO WRITERS I am forever grateful for the women -past and present - who labour to Take apart Bend Stretch Twist words to gift us with language that articulates our most obscure and nebulous thoughts.

If that's not creation, I don't know what is.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

MAMA I have always marvelled at the ability of mothers to mirror God. How they've turned plenty waters into wine.

How they've died millions of nights only to resurrect in the morning.

How amidst tears and pleas, they've drank from the bitter cup.

How they become the 5 loaves and 2 fishes that nourish multitudes.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

NDIYABULELA Wena Mbali Ntyatyambo yam kwelihlathi libubomi.

Ubuhle bentliziyo yakho buyaphilisa.

Mehlo am xa obubumnyama bundiphandla.

Uyayincumisa intliziyo yam.

Elo ncumo lungapheli.

Ndithi na xandingakuboni, iingcinga zakho zindikholise.

Litha lam lokukhanya.

Wena ntliziyo eluthando.

Wathanda aboni abangenani esandleni.

Wathanda sityebi, hlwempu ngokufana.

Wandithanda ndingakwazi.

Wandithanda ndingumoni ongaboni.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

NDIYABULELA Ubuhle bakho buguqisa amadolo am.

Buso bam buqubude kuNyana owafayo.

Ndibulele oluthando.

Ntliziyo yam iphuphuma luvuyo nemincili.

Kuba wena wandithanda ndingaboni.

Wandithanda ndingakwazi.

Wandithanda ndingumoni.

Uyintyatyambo ebukekayo.

Uyintyatyambo kulentliziyo yam.

Ububomi obupheleleyo.

Ntliziyo yam iyakulangazelela.

Mehlo am ajonga phezulu ekhangelana nawe.

Ntyatyambo ndini ndiyazithoba.

Kuba wena wandenyula Kobudoti belilizwe.

Wandihlamba ndingeyonto.

Wandithanda ndingaboni, Wandithanda ndingumoni.

Afterword

Sandisiwe Yengeni

WOMEN KEEP SAVING ME Grateful for the women that lift me up and keep me up...

For my mother and her shouting generosity. My first love and true north. My first physical sign of God's existence For my sisters, gracious victims of imperfect efforts through the learnings of love and unwavering dedication For my aunts, blood and otherwise - what I truly mean when I talk about my village For my cousins and nieces, holding hands as we learn together For my friends that raise me up and hold me in the clouds. Then bring me down and invite me to behold Christ, the real treasure. My first audience and affirmation of whimpering efforts For Zora and her words that expand my world For Toni and Nina and their largesse existence even to strangers like me

Sandisiwe Yengeni

WOMEN KEEP SAVING ME For all the women who defy what they are told they ought to be, existing instead as constructs of their understanding of God’s calling. Seeking the truest sense of what it means to be image bearers For those who press forward in dedication, joy and kindness in a world that glorifies the grotesque For the women that will be, and how the thought of them pushes some of us to greater legacies For the women that were, and how the thought of them reminds us to live fuller and truer For Mawande and sis Ndileka and Zindzi and Thando and sis Asavela and sis Nosisa and my grandmother.

Names that serve as a living memorial, a constant reminder to try and try and try to be their wildest dreams. To actively and constantly choose certainty and clarity when worldly mists distort and distract.

Grateful for all those standing with me in the sun, allowing both the warmth and scorching to raise us all to better versions and heights of self. From breath to death - the rising and setting of life in our current form, glory be to God in and through and for it all.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

PENNING DOWN THOUGHTS I do not write because it feels good to do so.

I write to pour out all that lies unsaid, bottled inside me.

I write for the sake of my sanity.

I write to release.

I write to expose my vulnerabilities.

To expose my insecurities because I know otherwise, you would never dare look close enough to see them.

Otherwise you would never care.

So I'll write to make you care.

I'll write and force you to stare.

I'll write and expose all those ugly things you usually wouldn't want us to share.

I'll write to show you how weak I am.

In my writing, I pray that I somehow make you care.

Even if it's a little. Even if it's not enough.

Sandisiwe Yengeni

PENNING DOWN THOUGHTS So I'll keep writing.

I'll keep my ink flowing.

I'll write everywhere.

I'll write on everything I can find.

Till your heart is filled with compassion.

Till my words scream loud enough that you can clearly hear.

And even if you don't, even if you never care, I'll keep writing.

If not for you then for my own freedom.

To break my own chains.

To bring healing to my own heart.

I write because its more painful not to.

So I write...