Packing Hope

I am sure that this is not how packing a box should feel. It has felt different, I suppose it can feel anyway it wants. But not this way.

Packing my box feel like a journey.
Without...anything really.
It feel like I am getting into a car, driving up to the traffic circle and having to choice between left or right. But I am so baffled and almost horrified by the fact that I have no clue where I am going. Then I start thinking how even that thought has some kind of direction and hope, that all I have to do is choose. Then the road in front of me gets clouded with mist, but even that does not explain my journey because even grey clouds have a sliver lining, all I have to do is move. Slowly. But move, knowing there is something in front to catch my foot.

Packing my box feels or is more like standing at a cliff. Packing my box means stepping off the cliff. Walking in the dark might even be better, but packing my box without a stamp on it is one of those things I wish to never experience again. Assuming that I survive the fall, and not that I wasn't falling before, but that I am falling at a different speed.

                                                                    Part 2.
More than anything, packing a box like this is how I imagine faith to be.
Faith asked me to take a step with both my feet off the cliff and hope that I take the next one.
Faith says  there is  a bridge, its really there, the blind can not see it.
"But it will appear even before you: like disco blocks, like sensing lights, like a bride's aisle."

Packing my box feels like a  journey really.
Packing a box like this is like getting into a car, starting the engine without a destination.
Packing my box is like faith really, packed with Hope. 

Yesterday's Thoughts

Yesterday's thoughts stayed where they belong.
I tried my best to push them through.
I tried my best to remember.
The moment was like when the waves hit shore,
Break down on me and tossed me to the shells.
Then it was gone just like it came.
No recollections.

Seating with a crowd
Reading about my heart in more ways than one.
Then something happened inside me,
It shacked me awake and set me off.
But time still moved
And so did friends
And so did something.

Yesterday's thoughts stayed where they belong:
In the moment that they found me in
In the place that I felt and left them in.
Yesterday.

Dear Word

Nothing like words to hold on to
Words that fall like rain
Seem so hard to catch
Word. Free to those who once had them
And accusers to those oblivious to them
These are the people who are blessed enough with ignorance

Blessed enough not to save themselves
With just an utter
Words  packed with security and death stands at the back of the row
Soon, if not already, his turn will come.

Words, I find myself at your mercy and instruction
Am wrapped in your charm and wink
In the way that you look at me
And fill my quick desire to be present with you.
Words, how I am so lost with you
And speechless, out witted.

Word, word I cant find it lately
Word, word is all I can say
Word, word I have no letter left
For the first time I find myself
Drowning, trying, failing
To blurred out the ghost stuck in my throat

 Word, I find myself without you
When I can not share you
Word, they cant hear you past what I my heart is silently screaming out
Word, I find myself holding on to paper in the land filled with honey
You in the balance for my heart
Word, I find myself holding you
And presenting you to people who do not understand you
It seems I am lost for words when I can not share you.

Holiday Club 2013

It is almost time for the most exciting time of the year. In the 3 years that I have done holiday club it has always been a life changing experience where I meet amazing people with stories I would otherwise never hear. And where I make friends whom I hope to keep for a life time.

This is one event that which as soon as it is done planning for the next one begins, it needs intense detail to leave enough room for fun, for the kids and the leaders. Its funny how this whole program is a process that can only be seen for what is it by someone who was in it and was out of it. It cannot be judged in the meantime only after. Holiday Club builds character and that is one thing you can not buy or do on your own.  I have a totally new appreciation for the directors and behind the scene faceless crew who make all of this happen. I say new because in the past I have always seen it as people who have to organize the piece of the puzzle but now I see that the puzzle pieces have to be made before they can be used. The making is the most difficult part because of the time it takes to prepare and the clear vision it requires. One can not simply make something without seeing how it will look and what it will be used for.

And so I encourage and applause every single person who invested into holiday club: leaders, mentors, directors, pastors, businesses, and the church. Thank you for your dedication, time, focus, finances, prayers and willing hearts so that in one week there can be lots of fun and importantly that thousands of lives can be changed.

Dedicated to Eastside Community Church.

How much for the bride?

Being a South African black girl in her 20-ties and living in a white community but grew up in a black community makes this question odd and old for me. I have had many of my white friends ask me about lobola ( A tradition practiced in a black culture where the bridegroom would pay the bride's parents  either in a form of cows, land or nowadays cash. But then the brides parents pay for the wedding.) and many of my black friends would joke about how their parents still believe in the lobola practice. I often, if not always, joke with them and go on about how silly the thought of someone paying for you is not only illiberal and archaic for us (new generation) but that under the line it is insulting.  What if you get a poor husband, or a rich husband who believes in saving or a husband who disagrees? What if your parents ask for too little or nothing for you? How do they calculate how much you worth and can they really stop you from getting married?

A white friend of mine asked her black domestic worker about the lobola practice. Her worker explained to my friend that the husband pays in cows and then turned the question around: "How many cows did your husband pay for?". Everybody knows only black people practice lobola. Right? Not this black lady. In short my friend was caught off guard by the same question she asked a minute earlier and got thrown to the lions. She took a moment to think and pounded at how strange it is to be asked a question she has nothing to do with, a few more split seconds of pondering, she calculated that her wedding ring is worth just as much as her worker's lobolas' trade, maybe. So oppositely similar.  The whole week she could not stop playing that short, innocent scene in her mind. Some would call this a culture shock... in your backyard (that for free).

What took her a week took my the opinion I have been strongly preaching away.  When a boy takes a girl to the movies he pays, when a man marries a woman he buys a ring and gets down on his knees (in white culture), and when men wants to get married he pays lobola (in black culture). I would have never understood this since I pay for my own movies and take myself out and see idylls of equal love.

It is not human to think that sacrifice is necessary but sacrifice we do.

I think of Jesus here. He loves us, He loved us all this time but He could not be with us because of sin. So He sacrificed. He died for us than rather not be with us. Like a perfect gentleman, He paid for the movie, He bought the ring, He went down on His knees and He paid lobola and acted Father who paid for the wedding.

Lobola might be "a black thing" just like wedding rings are considered "a white thing" but at the end it’s the same, what matters in not how much you worth but the sacrifice. 

The Cliff

Trembling.

My guts tied in a perfect not.

Keeping me grounded.

I am going to jump of the cliff.

Go, Jump, Do it, Don’t think about it

Go, Jump Adolf.

I yell and shout from the top of my lungs.

Along the journey I am reminded of

all the time I sat on the left side of the couch with my friend.

Go, go to university.

Go, go talk to her.

If you want to do go do it.

Go jump off the cliff.

Because I can't do it.

You see, I can't swim.

Toes hanging in the air,

Feet planted on this piece of rock.

I look down. I am going to die.

Gripping anxiety rushes through me and hugs me tighter than mom.

I want to take a moment to check how much my hands are shaking. I am not going to miss this.

Adolf took turns giving his cells a chance to see the view.

Up and down, back and forth.

Just when he thought he had seen enough, he takes one more trip forth only to make sure and take a the trip back again.

We watched and waited.

We were determined not to leave him there but to get him here, where we stood  looking up at him.

"Go, jump, jump!" I shouted louder.

So desperately wanting to stand    here.

The shaking turned to a vibrating to the pit of my stomach.

Then I lost sight of my senses.

All that was left was me and my mind.

'stop it.' I told her.

'Don’t think about it.' I said.

'Go, jump, JUMP!' I jumped.

I don’t recall flying, but floating in

It felt safe, tight and perfect in the longest 1…2…3...seconds.

 I was waiting for friends to come get me.

They were waiting for me to swim up

But you see...the thing is I can't swim and its hard to kick when your thighs are on fire.

Goodie Bag

Walking looking at the sky/crowding every memory / that follows behind/ memories of me around/

Feeling a little insecure inside/

Trying to remember why/ looking all around/can't find the reason/ but don't care much/ later not sooner it will fall away where it belong with the rest of them in my bag./

Walking looking at the sky/ today I choose to look up/ I choose to see the blue/ I choose to toss all the goodness I have left/ into the air and watch as the cottons turns into an elephant, daisy, turtle, babies, heart, heart, heart.

When later arrives I will be sure to not to look behind/ I will be sure to run/ I will be sure of you, I will be.

Still walking looking at the sky /saving all the goodness I have left/ saving it for you/

I wonder what you will say or what you see/ when I paint my righteousness about. Will you see my cotton, bubbles, fluff, cloud, mist,... and fade?/ will you fade away to my phobias, not so secure place, my pain, terrors, snobbish, pride, arrogance, bitter and unforgiving place, my bad-ies.

I want you look at my goodness/at those baby turtle daisy elephants/ I want you to see my heart.

Walking looking at the sky/ crowding every memory that follows behind/ memories of me around you/ feeling a little insecure inside/ I guess sooner came rather than later/ you still look at my bad-ies but later not sooner will soon come around/ and they will fall away where they belong with the rest of them./ and I will fill my goodies bag with soft stuffing for you to launch across the blue. This might to be a love metrical composition/ where I will tell you what to see/ today I chose to leave the bad-ies at home/ I choose to fill up with sweet stuff/ I choose to walk to the sky.

Story Teller

I am the story teller

Tell me and I will reach the destined ears.

I am the story teller

Tell me and I will carry your load with me

I who makes yours my own will take up your banner

I will wave it

I will stand like a leaf in the wind,

I will be the touch down anchor for your surfboat

I will chain you to your cell

I, your story teller will be you just for now.

I am your author.

I will describe, define, and defend to defile you.

Covering you with warm words

I read you a discussion of might bes' after I skilfully lay the story down.

I will tack you in and kiss you with assurance

My lamp burns throughout the night

Word after word

So you can awake to something sounding new.

When the word is out

I follow.

I am a story teller.