FUTURE LOVE

FUTURE LOVE

When red dust and birds dance in warm skies
I could forget everything that you told me
Yet a single glance fills the months

With one word the weight of an entire night
Spontaneously, a grand portal unlocks
Releasing an eager summer morning
A flood of light upon a tremendous scene

Nature charges with this radiant language
Inviting me fast to this fertile moment
The sweet earth and her abundant loaves
Beckoning love’s chosen mate

Bees obsess over warm nectar
A breathing sanctuary waits vibrantly erect
The sticky atmosphere swells heavy with purpose,
Another hot day changes her mind

From the startle of unrestrained tears
Frenzied kisses darting at my sandy feet,
To the intoxicating steam rising softly with the salts

Is it this world or the underworld that trembles with me,
Pleasure exceeding pleasure itself
Oh my God, oh my God
This love

Ahh, yes
Some afternoons are made for these heavenly showers
To bathe in the knowledge of her sacred body
Drenched in the assurance
That I am made to love

All the dreams of yesterday are awakened like this
All the matters of the heart are revealed like this
All the disasters of tomorrow are rinsed away like this

Eroding away concrete’s persistence
Eroding away concrete’s plans

How the rapid cool babbles over pebbles and stones
How your omnipotent glory moves everything
How racing rivers swirl heavy into the seas
How they speak of your ungovernable force
How everything vibrates your name

And in this very same moment
Far but not so very far off from here
A monumental glacier blasts free
Piercing great bodies of heavy water
A reverberating Boom

Ice blood gushing through the rolling sea
Her magnificent currents sculpting new lands
Wild birds scatter upwards into the blue
Debris and shredded shorelines
A new season moans

Much further out still
Beyond these earthly scenes
The moon continues to manifest the earth’s heartbeats
A pulse that holds my story with me
The dreams of my receptive body
All of it is God’s music

A decision expands,
The extent of an immeasurable power
Faith, encoded in a seed

And inside my indigenous memory
I remember a fiery womb
A warm chamber of crackling sparks
My great grandmother’s glistening eyes
The reflection of my activated storms

As I move deeper into the arctic forest
In the kind of cold that ignites survival
And as night lays its icy ink on evergreens
A fierce wind carries my resistance songs

And no matter how dark the hour gets, I breathe
The only thing left for me to do is to accept this
Everything I believe in is reflected in my own eyes
There are no more ordinary reasons for making love.

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2024.

Write your dreams into existence

I started my poetry blog “Nomzi Kumalo, What Are You Waiting For?” because I did not know how else to get through what I was going through, sober. This was 6 years ago, today. 

I had buried my dreams so deep inside of me that life eventually shook me so hard, to such an extent that I had to surrender my inner world to you with my words. This daily practice became my way of opening my heart and remembering the way to my dreams.

Do not underestimate the power of writing down your own words. The practice will positively impact different aspects of your life. Start writing. Speak into a voice recorder if you must. See what happens. 

I will have my first ever release concert, 26 February 2020 at Herr Nilsen, in Oslo.  It will be cool to see you, so come and say hello.

Also, my poetry book is marinating and I can’t wait to get it ready for publishing and share it with you. Thank you for being here. Love always, Nomzi ❤️🥰💖🌸🌺💓🥳❤️🥰❤️💓

Photo: Nabeeh Samaan.

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2020.

Thank you

I registered on WordPress 5 years ago. It is truly wonderful to see familiar faces from back when I started. How far we have come. It also feels good to welcome new faces here too. Love is everywhere you look, it’s true.

Jot down words on a piece of paper. Start writing and see what happens to your life.

Wishing you good health and all the best in 2019 🌸

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2019.

Editing

Life can get challenging sometimes, so when it does, find the light; in a poem, a song, a good conversation, a shared meal, rest, under a tree or by the sea.

I remember going through a painful period in my life that pushed me to write my first WordPress post about returning home to South Africa, essentially to myself. Some day I will tell you about how poetry chose me back then. For now I keep writing and editing my poetry book.

Over 1000 followers later, I am truly grateful for your support, guidance and inspiration 🌸

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2017.

Call my ugly

Call each and every ugly part of me
Until there is none left for me to cling to
Until they are no longer mine to carry
Free to be of what I am made.

I dedicate this poem to those who have called my ugly; and in so doing have awakened me to my humility; my true calling. From the time that we are born our lives are abundant with gifts. They will misname them. Our work is to rise above that.

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2016.

 

How to remove the dread from the locks.

I used to dread the dreadlock until I let my locks, my hair grow out on its own. So that I can let you know that I too am love. Be gentle with yourself. There is courage and freedom and inner peace to be gained from this.

Dreadlocking

Forests of dark coily hair jerseyed
Into the fabric of my immigrant life
Understanding what is my ground
Something that’s not yours to name.

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2014.

“Be careful of your thoughts, for your thoughts become your words. Be careful of your words, for your words become your actions. Be careful of your actions, for your actions become your habits. Be careful of your habits, for your habits become your character. Be careful of your character, for your character becomes your destiny.” Ancient Chinese philosopher, Lao Tzu.

A Human Encounter

As though I am built of some other material
That neither you nor I can make out
Whether you are shapeshifting or maybe I

Beautiful warm burgundy animal blood
Humping thumping breathing organs
Fingerprint all my genes awake

Ancient codes in each and every cell
Popping flesh bubbles and children unborn
It’s my turn it’s my turn it’s my turn it’s mine

Survival in the love and war of the breeders
Horniness half hysterical on a cliff edge
Commanding a thousand valleys a thousand streams

Hot savage bliss in the climax to live on
Significant insignificance as we bow our heads
To surrender to such violence in rebirth.

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2014.

Originally posted 15 March 2014

Why not self publish

I am inspired and eternally grateful for each and every one of your posts that plant seeds of endless possibilities for my life: your precious reminders to keep receiving, creating and giving. I am considering to translate a selection of my poems into Norwegian for them to be published in a book at a publishing house here where I live; connect with the people who I live with. I am also aware of the fact that my readership is mainly english speaking and Norwegians do speak and read english.

Perhaps to focus on self publishing an english poetry book is the way to go. What am I waiting for?

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2016.

Stay

And Frida’s red ribbons
For each man who is looking for art
When respect was never found in looks
For each woman who is looking for security
And love was never found inside books
Romance for what it is worth has left us divorced
Where everything better is waiting in another place
When we have yet to learn to stay
Where pure joy is.

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2015.

City trees know

Buildings stand as concrete as the cold truth
Revealing a day as empty as a new rubbish bin
Yet the trees seem to know what to do with this
This longing longing longing for the eternal light

Leaves now quivering in the chilled silver winds
Yes the city trees do what they are meant to do
Nothing more despite the facades of progress
They are not anxious about it, no not at all.

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2015.

Over the Seas

The oceans swell
As tears become saltier with loss
And bodies crash behind wintry doors
Groping for any familiar textures of humanity
That these foreign lands begin to recall
For mothers and fathers who abandon understanding
Just to smell the soil of a better life.

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2015.

Inside Autumn

Multicoloured leaves along the street in a hill
Wood soaked and sweetened by the rain falling
Merciful water dripping onto quiet pavements
Dribbling slippery down the tarred thirsty road

A neutral sky where the air harbours no pressure
The rooftops and local windows leaking domestic
An uninspired dog lays heavy by an entrance hall
When there is nothing to do is there nothing to do

Flattened tired carpets still pretend to be luxury
Inside wooden walls of the same old thing again
Sometimes the coffee steaming will hold comfort
One of those days without a name to label it by

Forgotten picture frames capture some yesterdays
Glossy managed smiles and gestures from parties
The trolls and magnets and broken love messages
Settled into grown up life and ways of escaping it

The stale kitchen mood meets a crisp autumn air
Spring long dead visits the city to play some tricks
Sunlight so mild giving agonizingly little warmth
To feed the endless day ahead and years of ordinary.

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2014.

Originally posted 10 October 2014

Love until the end of time

When beauty no longer misleads us
When our bodies no longer separate us
When our achievements are forgotten
When all our mistakes have softened
When talking is no longer a commodity
When love abandons physical currency

When you have been there all along.

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2014.

Originally posted 8 December 2014.