Rumpus Original Poetry: Three Poems by Sihle Ntuli

The Jazz Bantu

A fade-in so silky smooth,
like a night spent in Masekela’s Tunisia,

the slow the gradual
groove sliding inside
inner walls of the living room,

illuminating dark hued blues,
movement of the hands smothering drums

the bump the bop the sway
the soles the way

                 the feet of Gil Scott Heron
                     hit the ground
                     on   Running.

the delight of kaleidoscope kiss
on melanin skin glowing

fury of the conga invoking ghosts
the clash the crash
the climaxing crescendo

a soundsystem science
a haunting séance
then suddenly,
behold!

the spirit of the Jazz Bantu,
breathing,

hologram of the epoch,
slow burn the gentle death
to the point of echo

to less vibration
              a gradual let-down
of hollow walls,
               the residue,
the slow fade-out,
               the spirit vanishing

with the very same mystique that it came.

Meditations on the Near Death

                                 I will tell you about
the vicious slobbering dogs of suburbia
and how they would growl how they sounded different,
because this country of my skull in the past the mauling of so many
that looked just like me
armed with only that vulgar word, voetsek    a word that was no match
for canine teeth,     locked deep into the flesh
of the trauma left there,
informed by the theory of ‘die swart gevaar’
( or black danger )
  their owners are yet to make the time to unteach their beasts
   may God help us and teach us how to run.

I will tell you of how once,
an Afrikaner man having just interviewed me for a job,
took me out for lunch to a restaurant in Bloemfontein,
and afterwards
he insisted that i do not touch the bill,
for the food that i had
just swallowed
but
not tasted,
I read somewhere
that the loss of sensation in the tongue is called
ageusia,
he asked me to say grace for him
to bless his food in my mothers tongue
the loss started shortly after
I obliged him,

and there is so much more to it that than this,
about a year and
four months’ worth,

but for now
I am left waiting for closure
of the flesh raw open red
gentle breeze
like stroke of pain
in this moment,
there is still
a wincing.

Aftertaste

In the past,                      I have sung
with hush tones             and under my breath
from my mouth              down to my throat
and now, to my protest       the pruning of die stem,
                            because,
                                         the oldest part
                                         of my countries anthem,
                                         always leaves behind
                                          a taste of blood.