FREE-VERSE POETRY by Douglas Gilbert

I am not a polemic she cries;
my son has been to University
many years escaping to
the evil UK

He’s a grand young man
a scholar
I proudly miss, and child
I kiss you
out of my African womb
to be free
even as a Trojan
in the colonialists paradise,
but I trust you to be civil
unlike the rips of your savage birth

Robert Mugabe
has betrayed us, my son
sold his soul to the devil

Oh poor Thabo Mbeki,
weakened by prestige
prancing diplomacy
dining in world circles,
you should know
Nelson Mandela is
the only true hero of the revolution

Oh poor Thabo,
you and Mugabe
sip the takings of the hyena
in the audience of the Savannah,
mingling with vultures
and hippos
unwilling to stalk the prey
of dictatorship

My house has been burned down
by militants of the ruling party

I shall not vote again

I die of many wounds

My son, Spartacus
learn your
Greek and Latin
lessons well

You are in the world
of the noticed, and
I am anonymous

But I love you
my champion

*Zimbabwe Cries*

I had a nightmare.
Mugabe could not
concede

Mugabe came with clubs
for poor Useni my friend
who had walked with canes
to vote for Patrick Chitaka
and Morgan Tsvangirai

Saw a red cloud, as
a storm brewed, brooding
Useni in the sky,
eyes on Morgan
Tsvangirai

Billy clubs rained, the
reign of Mugabe came
blood again, a bluster
of thunder
paranoia

For the peace of revenge
we had cheered when
Mugabe thugs killed
white colonialists
seized their
farms, pieced into plots

Little food growing in sin
blood rained on our land,
a billion dollars
for inflated bread

Thought I saw
Useni in a mist
with Morgan, Patrick
and Martin