Pray for Spring

Warm gentle rays
Briefly unclench the concrete town
Winter draining into the swollen underearth
Whose bowels digest the dark of your discontent
But who am I to mistake your magnificence
Your cool air invigorating life’s purpose
Oh lift me up
Once more.

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2015.

The Sounds of love

Atoms alarms and lizard links
Sacred spirits with breathing hearts
When even grief itself is losing its grip
And humiliation has lost my name
Only time has all the time in the world
While my memories carve my place
Warnings may not sound like love
Love may sound like warnings.

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.

Kitchen in my religion

Hands deep in the communal water
Love, the kitchen cupboards, dishes
Piled up again to live out my religion

My feet and my heart, compassion
How comforting the steaming kettle
Whistling my life pressures away

Naked before all of my confessions
I now wipe the table clear of dirt
Breathe hymns into the soft season.

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2014.

Small city rain

Beautiful cool sticky city rain
One appreciates after sickness
Or a strange kind of love affair
Or waking in a different home
Pavements rinsed of yesterday
And the concrete eventually sighs, relief
For a weight has finally left my chest
Into the sweet grey merciful day
Tears that stream towards their place
Burning to return the love and move
Move to where the ocean curves.

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2014.

Pity party

So then I repeat my disasters
Swap their miserable positions
And frame every single misery
As though each is honourable

Nail them fast to the afternoon
They protect the other reasons
Tiring each other out once more
But oh so familiar and oh so safe.

Copyright © Nomzi Kumalo, 2014.