Poetry by Sihle Ntuli

Something in the Water

there is something down there,
biding its time / under a bridge / I struggle to cross

indecipherable  language of  rivers
serenades of running water / intuition an unreliable guide

in hushed tones / a soft voice leads me in  / for a closer look

from the distance  I appear as if leaning in
to the river to drink /  & this would not be
that far removed from the truth

for I  can barely remember  the last time
I fell to my knees / & began to pray.
 

Sunday

in my neighbourhood,
there are  four churches
all on one road,
each one not too far from where I live
& yet still I find myself unable
to attend a single one.
the road gets so awful on a Sunday morning
that I have even resorted to
placing  bricks in front of our driveway
to block churchgoers from parking their cars
directly in front of our lawn.
lately I have begun to notice
that the road where I live has powers,
it is able to instantaneously halt
any kind of  vehicle, sometimes even stopping them
right in the middle of a road.
I tell my brother
that I would not be surprised
if one day we find a car parked  vertically
or two cars parked up against one other
as if to emulate the Kama Sutra,
such is the urgency to strip themselves
of reason, before entering into a holy place.
I have even grown used to listening
to sweet gospel hymns
from an open kitchen window,
the floral fragrance of choral harmony
the sheer power of  the will of voices,
each a note of  musical perfume,
sweet sound spellbinding and swaying
enough for a tender embrace with grace,
not longer after, the silencing of the chorus
will usually be followed by the sermon
by the hoarse-voiced pastor.

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