The Sounds of Exile

When the frontier
Slashes like a blade
Across the wrist
Of the soul
(As some
Would call it
Others
A Stygian hole
Out of which
No light escapes)

When, indeed,
The sight of light
Escaping through the crevices
Of mountain peaks
In the early morning
And the smell of wild
Lavender bushes
And the sound
Of goats bleating
Around the village
Or the roar
Of traffic
The weeping of saxophones
In the city
Behind
Have gone from the senses
And remain only
As the clattering
Of an old newsreel
In your distant mind
In a distant city

Then stop
Pause
Listen
Hold your palms up
To the only wind
That blows home
for now
From the dark clubs
And lamplit stages
Of London
Amsterdam
Stockholm
New York
Brussels
Moscow
Berlin
Harare
Gaborone

For peace sake
Hear the breeze
Blowing from the rumbling drums
Of Julian Bahula
The trembling strings
Of Lucky Ranku
Gusting us home
From Amsterdam
In the May of 1976

Come
Let us go to Gaborone
In that July
Of 1982
Surround ourselves
With the fecund minds
The limber fingers
And lithe lips
Of Wilson ‘Kingforce’ Siljee
Denis Mpale
Jonas Gwangwa
Hugh Masekela

And with Abdullah Ibrahim
Who said

We don’t think
Of ourselves as being
In exile
This is a strategic
Retreat

And sang

Thula
Dubula
No need to say much more
It’s all been said
And tried before
It’s all over now
But the dying

And come
Once more
Down the Gaborone road
To the Woodpecker
On the banks of
The Molopo River
As we look across the frontier
To home
With the sounds of
Bra Hugh and
Bra Jonas
And Steve Dyer
Blowing behind us
While the stones-throw enemy
Listens

Now
On the wind of jazz
See the light
Defying gravity
Escape
From the dark hole