Filling in the Gaps
I am eating summer fruit yoghurt and avoiding the fruit. Sometimes it pays to be wilful, wishful, a little wild, because people reserve the right to leave at any time and not care that you may not want to let them go.
I am eating multi-grain rice cakes and watching TV by lamp-light – I wish I could dance, move, from the inside out. Some mornings clouds take over and the body cannot move to defend itself, because the mind has taken fright. There is no rescue in Time.
I am eating perfumed papaya and thinking of trees I didn’t climb, thinking of taking up running, doing it bit by bit; to put a foot in front of the other and go. I have been walking but I want to fly. This earth cannot hold me.
I am crushing ice-cubes into juice. It’s frozen outside but the sun has kissed the oranges in my glass. It’s like we never stopped talking but say hello when we mean goodbye – this kind of thirst is temporary, your mother would have told you not to worry, nothing stays the same,
even that which doesn’t seem to change. These things don’t happen overnight:
losing love, understanding truth in spite of someone else, the realisation of
hope –
knowing, that dreams come in holding on, while letting go.
- Blessing Musariri
Bevelyn Dube holds an MA in English from the University of Zimbabwe, and is currently teaching Media Studies while studying for her doctorate in Journalism with the University of Stellenbosch.On Poetry International she reviews the work of Blessing Musariri a young Zimbabwean poet:
Blessing Musariri is one of the most exciting young female poets to emerge from Zimbabwe during this century. What makes Musariri’s work refreshing is that she insists on her individuality, as seen in her choice of themes. Unlike most of her contemporaries (Zwisinei Sandi, Ethel Kabwato, Joyce Chigiya and Fungai Machirori), who grapple with the ‘usual’ topics of womanhood, land, politics, violence and governance, Musariri chooses to use her poetry to make a spirited stand for her individuality. Through her poetry, she declares herself different and rejects all attempts to make her conform. Her poetry is a cry for self-expression, a declaration for individualism and creative freedom. More
