Once upon a time, there was a traveller. The traveller travelled all over the world. From Bangkok to Calgary the traveller travelled and saw the sights and was content with how much they had travelled. But one day, the traveller thought, "maybe it's about time for me to settle down in one place. I've seen them all, so let me choose my favorite and go live there!" So the traveller travelled to Japan, and found a beautiful house by a beautiful lake. But the traveller was not happy there. The lake brought too many mosquitos and the traveller got malaria and almost died. So the traveller moved, naturally. This time, the traveller found a house in Egypt. It was just the right temperature even in the hot desert sun. But, unfortunately, the traveller was constantly getting sunstroke when they left the thouse and almost died. So the traveller moved again. The traveller next found a village along the Amazon River that they had visited once before. The people welcomed the traveller back with open arms, and the traveller was happy. Until McDonald's came and started tearing down the forest around them, displacing that village and 126 others. The traveller had no choice but to move. The traveller found a number of places to stay that weren't satisfactory or healthy. The traveller found houses in The USA, but the systemic racism scared the traveller away eventually. Then it was Turkey, and then Greece, and then Hungary. But the traveller found the same refugee problem all over, and did not want to live around people who don't want to help refugees. The traveller travelled to South Africa, but the lions that roamed the streets were far too scary. Almost as scary as the racist people hiding in the crevices of the suburban facade and the terrible state of the local currency. The traveller travelled to the DRC, but that didn't last long. Need I explain this one?
Anyway, the traveller finally decided that the place to live would have to be somewhere quiet, and stable, and healthy, and not racist, and friendly. The traveller decided to try Swaziland. I mean, they had been there once for this half naked people festival and the weed was apparently very good. So the traveller found a place in Swaziland, and decided that this was the place for them, as long as they didn't have unprotected sex and didn't piss off the authorities, the traveller would survive. So the traveller stayed longer than they had stayed anywhere else. And told stories of all the places that they had been and things that they'd seen and the like to the children at the school that they taught at. One day, one child in the class nasked the deepest question of the traveller's life. "Comrade Traveller," because the traveller was a communist, "What have you learned from all your travels?" The traveller was shocked. They had never thought about what they had learned from their time on the road, only seeing and experiencing. But there was this one thing that always resonated within the traveller's mind when they travelled. So the tired traveller, sitting on the floor amongst the students said;
"Listen closely my children. Travelling is fun and all, and you see things and experience things you would never see if you were in one place. But nothing will ever, EVER be better than home." And just then, the traveller stood up and left. The students never saw the traveller again, but the children can still remember the look on the traveller's face as they left. It was a look of happiness. And they were sure that the traveller was going home.
Thursday, 31 December 2015
The Traveller
2015. Another One.
After many travels and trials and tribulations, the year is almost drawing to a close. What have we learned? What have we gained? What has changed in our lives? Some of us have lost loved ones. Some of us have found our way through and others are still looking. This year was much like any other. Just the same things happening to different people. We're simple like that, you and I. Whatever divine being/s you believe looks over you (even if you don't think there is one) just sguffle the cards and deal them out to new people every day. That's how I think things work. But then again, I am a mad person with maddening emotions and a simple view of how the world should work. But alas, the world doesn't work and we have yet another year in our pockets with not much to show for it as a species. I suppose we should find solace in the simole things that make every day all the more colourful. The things that complete the look. Give the picture a gradient. Make living worth another shot. That fir me is what a new year symbolises. A refresh button on your perspective. Not that it works very often, but this is what we must do to survive, am I right? Otherwise, our world would come crashing down. And we don't want that. We just want to live our lives and die happy and in peace. So, here's to the new year! Not that it means anything legitimate, but we need a reason to celevrate every once in a while. Thanks for sticking with me this long lonely year. It's been tough on me, but I count this as a milestone towards success. To the person in charge of everything, I say "Another one". Peace be with you all as you go into the new year.
Sunday, 13 December 2015
Untitled 2
I lowkey want to send you a text. Is that too much? Is it too soon for me to want to wish that you weren't so distant? You aren't even close to being close to me. You're a myth to my body but you're the truth to my mind. You. are. amazing. But I can't compare. Me with all my flaws and my hatred and my anger for things so small that their insignificance is insignificant. If only I had the time, the patience, the courage to tell you that I think you're beautiful. Not like that guy who would tell you that for free at the supermarket, but from deep down. From a place that has know love and hate before and has been torn to pieces and rebuilt. I don't think I'll see clearly until this glass goes away from between us keeping us separated from one another. But have we ever been together you and I? We've spent time and wasted time and made time, but we've never... never really had time, have we? I suppose that's how it goes though. And I doubt you'll ever figure out that these words are meant for you. This is something I rarely do, because I barely ever feel like anyone needs that much of me to commit to this soul baring. But this is yours, here's to you. Oh the places you'll go.
A Bit Of An Intro
I'll keep it short this time for you all. I've been having creative struggles of late, and this last poem kind of explains why, but also doesnt. Also ot has nothing to do with creative struggles, but the subject matter of this this next poem will explain just that. I feel like there may be a lot more that's yet to come out of my mind, but I hope it's soon so I can get my life together again.
Saturday, 21 November 2015
Aurum
All these voices in my head, please stop them with your you. Tell them to cease existing one by one and convince them they aren't real. You are the only one who can save me; you put me into this cage with all my demons. You left me unintentionally, but with your own determination to be clean good and golden. The golden girl with the golden hair, skin so fair, make up a story about how you're there but really you're an apparition just like I am. A fake figment of whatever imagination conjured you and I up, and we imagined that we'd be fine. But clearly I'm falling apart with all the purpose of a thousand pages of Okonkwo, don't get me wrong. I love you just like you say you love me but it hurts when the darkness closes in and the short fuse on candle-boom-stick doesn't keep it away for all that long. What use is a light if it only lasts as long as the attention span of a gold fish, golden hair, goldilocks, she locks away her heart and hides it from me with hugs and kisses and misses and emptiness that fills emptiness. Forgive me for trying not to cry at this sad scene, that the reflection of my existence as told by gingerly stepping around the looking glass through which I saw what I wanted to see. And again, I'm sorry. But I have to do me.
In The Meantime
Inbetween being here and there I struggle to be anywhere mentally. Having purpose is the main drive for some, working hard to get a car, to have a nice house, to be living a comfortable life. But I sometimes struggle to see the logic. Let me put it like this. You trade the skills that your body possesses (after education and work experience and all that) just to put food on the table? How can that be your purpose? That's a very roundabout way of getting to your end goal. But there are some who do it for more, and some who do it for less. Who am I to judge? I just have an opinion and I share it. But you see, with me the drive isn't about all the fancy things and the lavish lifestyle; I just want to find what makes me happy and hopefully I'll be able to do all of that and still be able to put food on the table. Sounds like a dream, right? I would not hesitate if the opportunity came my way. But all this talk of opportunity and privilege and money makes my tongue curl up because I know deep down that I probably won't care about all that extra stuff that people want. I don't know. It's like there's a kind of power that money has over us. It's become so subconscious that we blame it on other things and use words like "need" to justify our excessive consumerist tendencies. But alas, this is our reality and we do need some form of money to get us from day to day. I have yet to decide what I want to spend the rest of my life doing to placate my inner consumerist, and that is the scary part because between now and then, I have to seriously think about every step that I make and how it's related to the next step I'll take and so on. It's a challenging thing to just be thrust into the world and be pressured - if not expected - to flourish. And many people have the mindset for it. I am afraid I may have to mull a bit linger over that one and see how I fare later on. In the meantime, I'll just write about my feelings because that's all I have for now.
Wednesday, 11 November 2015
Uncreated World: Home
I could write a novel on the smells of home. My city town is warm, warmer than the sun, the sum of the warmth of its parts like no other. I could write a symphony on the sounds that it makes as it breathes in life and exhales slowly, holding on to each breath as long as it can. I can feel it moving beneath me, around me, inside me. This pride, this loathing, this love i have for my home. But, my eyes are still clouded by youth and inexperience and margins and percentages and statistics that make me a part of this, a part of that. I welcome the warmth of winter like it was summer's sweet kiss. And oh, how i have enjoyed my summers. I could write endless poems about how my summers are filled with love and beauty and longing. I wish I could show the world my home and see how proud I am of where I am from. But, there is always this loathing. I cannot release it from my heart for the love I have is the other side of my hatred. This is my home, but, I do not feel at home, I know not what the feeling of home is. I've tried to write prescriptions on how to feel at home, what medicinal route to take, what dosage I should take the sights in. But, my home is not mine to love. It was created by people who know nothing about me who I know nothing about. I can't make myself leave because this is the only thing like home I've ever known. But I do want to be free, outside where they sell 5 emalangeni umbila on the street. But I'll never fit in. Because my tongue does not roll the same way and my tone does not tone the same way. I am an outcast and a statistic. A percentage on a paper that more than 13% of the people of this country cannot read. Don't forgive me, for I have done nothing wrong, but let me be in peace and let me stay without quarrel. Because my home is mine. And nobody can take it from the depths of my heart.
Tuesday, 10 November 2015
Judging Me
Isn't it nice that everyone can write so well? That they have metaphors and similes and all that juxtaposition of alliterated whatever. And then there's me who has so much to say buy can't say it the way you like to hear it. I know, it's weird isnt it? That there's a method to how people want to write and how they end up writing is completely different. But here I am, simplifying everything because I don't want to not remember what and how and why I felt like writing. It's almost always about myself or someone who I care about really. Not many other people can put me in such a vulnerable emotional position to let loose and put oen to oaoer as it were. But I, alas, am not as eloquent as they need me to be. The literary minds of everyday people who decide whose poetry to engage with because it sounds like they should be snapping their fingers. And don't get me wrong, I have no beef with that, it's just. My heart hurts every time I write because I put a piece of my soul into each and every one if my poems and even these preludes to poetry have a fair bit of heart in them. But the flow, the intonation, the way you read it isn't supposed to do anything but make you think what I'm thinking, and paint an image in your mind's eye of how I'm feeling. And maybe it's my fault for not getting it across well enough, or even expecting too much from my writing. And maybe it's your fault for holding my words to the same standard you hold everything else to. I can't judge really. All I'm saying is let me write the way I write. Tips and hints and comments are fine but, they become condescending after a while and all I can picture is you thinking that you're better than how I feel. And that hurts. But I can bounce back, frankly I don't care what anyone thinks (almost a contradiction but not quite) i just want to write without people being judges about it to my face. Poets are sensitive people when it comes to their work. Respect that.
Tuesday, 27 October 2015
I am Bean. I am Bean. I am Bean.
I am Bean. What I am is not what you can eat, I am the idea of a perfect specimen manifested into an imperfect being that knows every one of his imperfections like the back of his hand. I can feel into the depths of my being and know where the hurt lies but not where it came from. It takes away my sleep, and it burns my eyes with the tears I'm too proud to cry, but I still wake up every day and pray that my feeling of inadequacy would go away. But it doesn't. Ive come to realise that it's quite chronic, and not even the medicine man can help me. I might be underweight and unfit and unhealthy, but that doesn't stop me from running head first into the unknown and seeing where it takes me. And sometimes it hurts, knowing that your best just isn't good enough, that you are strong everywhere but where you need to be. But I am Bean and I will stand tall wherever you place me, proud and steadfast like a lighthouse on a river, going to the moon in a fabricated dream. But you neurotypicals can't give me anything that will make me want to be like you. I am Bean. And I hope it stays that way.
A comment I received
I don't very often get comments on my poetry, because let's be honest; only like 10 people see what I've written. But let's pretend I do regularly get comments on my writing. I got this one comment from a friend of mine who said, "Your poetry isn't like regular poetry. It sounds like you're talking, not you using a poetic voice. I could literally imagine you saying all these things in a conversation." To put it simply, I didn't know what that meant. Was it good, was it bad? Do I need to stop talking like my life is a poem? So, I was stuck with this idea of my poetry in my head. How it sounded like me, and I really hate the way I sound. I sometimes wish I could shut myself up for a while sometimes, but hey. Anyway, I decided to take it as the compliment it actually was (I asked for confirmation) It's a sort of validation of my authenticity that my poetry sounds like casual, everyday, emotionally unstable, me. And so, to my friend who likes my poetry fro it's me-ness; Thank you for not pushing me to be something I'm not. For helping me stay away from the traps that catch so many writers of today who try and speak using someone else's voice. I'll be happy with my voice, even if it's only being heard by a few people. I do this because I love it and it helps. For no other reason would I lay myself so bare in front of unknown multitudes. Onwards.
Thursday, 22 October 2015
Two Sides of Me
Two sides of me
Delete, Delete, Delete
Delete, Delete, Delete
Monday, 12 October 2015
A Dream
I sit on the edge, and you sit next to me. Your hand feels cold and shivers blue light bouncing off the hard rock cliff. Our feet dangle into the nothingness and down below we can see the crisp shape of the moon laid out in pure silver and grey set in a deep dark sky. Lie back and take in the stars, hold your breath and count the moments that the earth steals away your thoughts. We could scream to the world and the world wouldn't hear us. We are free, unbound by lines and fences and gates and restriction. Free to be who we are and to be one with nature and nature. The blue moonlight only shows silhouettes, empty outlines without heart and soul. But I can still feel the warmth of yours and mine and we fight to keep this time of control over ourselves. We found the perfect place to dream, on the edge of our world.
About my Dreams
I often wonder how I can be a stranger in my own skin. Or an imposter, a fraud, a fake. Sometimes I feel so far down that I start to feel like I am not who I think I am. The doubt sets in, the constant picking on the flaws, the self-hatred. And it weighs down like a metal blanket over my body pinning me down for what feels like indefinitely. But somehow I manage to get back up. It's a nice climb, but I always worry when the next time I'll go down again is. It's inevitable with me, but it doesn't get any easier. I always end up wanting to curl up, to hide, to forget about the stresses that the world puts on us, on me, and sleep and dream of anything happy that will let out all the bad and hope that some good can find it's way in. I like the illusion of good that comes from my dreams. It often manifests itself as a companion, an extension of myself that gives me the courage to stare into oblivion and smile because I know that what I see isn't real at all but it gives me the greatest sense of calm.
Thursday, 8 October 2015
Hologram
Am I a hologram. Take thoughts and make sense of what you feel is easy but is so hard for me. Don't be that way, take me away, I want to live not jut exist. Keep my money, take it like you already have . Handcuff my fingers to my back pocket and take the dreams and hopes and goals from my already empty wallet. Walk me through walls and look right through me. I'm right in front of you, but nothing is really there. Am I a hologram that has a hollow beating heart and a pulse and lungs that are slowly dying from smoke? Can I be a hologram. It would be simpler to be hollow and not feel this. What is this ache. It's neither good nor bad, it's just not what I want to feel. I want my emotions to change like the seasons and my oh my if they could. I could do whatever they want me to. Because they control me, with their money and their qualifications and their fake niceness reality bullshit. Fuck this life that I'm living, it's not mine anymore and I don't want to lose any more of myself. But, this place has turned me into a hologram. A false representation of who I was. And there's no way to make matter out of nothing. And as soon as I step away from the source, I'm gone forever. Just a few centimetres to the edge and it could be over, but... to be continued...
Bear With Me
It will always take some time for you to realise what you want out of life. Sure there are things that can make you happy and there are things yhat you need to do to survive. The way the world is set out, those two things often don't coexist for me. But that's life right? You have to go out and find balance, and you have limited time because everyone will compare you to other people your age, with your skillset, with your goals. They only look at what you can do from the outside, not from how hard you have to struggle to overcome your own personal obstacles. It takes time, and time we dont have because our lives are shorter than we think. Every day goes by and we just seem to be going through the motions; making ends meet, doing what's asked of us, trying to make a living. We've changed the nature of survival so completely that we no longer look to just survive, we look to thrive in our own context. It makes it a bit more difficult because the bar gets raised higher and higher with each new generation, with each step forward we take as the human race. Keeping up isn't always as easy as it seems though, and those that fall behind become the antagonist of the story titled survival of the fittest. We as humans have given up the right to judge who is fit to survive and who isn't because we have placed a higher value on life than anything else. Or so they say. In real life, if you're plagued by notions of self hatred and despair and every day comes as a challenge not because you're struggling to survive, but because you're struggling to find purpose or a reason to live, you get left behind. Catching up is hard, it takes time. So please, bear with me.
Tuesday, 6 October 2015
I Write What I Like
It comes burning hot out of my fingertips smelling of fresh thoughts and ideas and internal struggle. I write to detox my brain, to let the creativity that acst as a counterbalance for my cynicism neutralise the acidic though processes and deliver them. Sweet, sumptuous thoughts on paper, on screen, from blunt fingertips sharpened by intellect and interpretation. Do not take my word for it; you may not like what what is on my menu, but I will cook it nonetheless. I am free to write as my mind sees fit, and I write what I like.
Significance
Once I thought I saw the future written in the stars on my skin. I thought I saw the moonlight glimmering in my eyes, I thought I owned the universe. I'm just a scared little human. A speck of dust on the sandy beach that is our existence, moving and eroding as the tide ebbs and flows by the will of the moon. But the universe is so big and I am so small, what can I do to feel significant? How can I change the tides of my existence? Peace of mind and peace of heart. To be content with the idea your existence is the first step towards having the ability to change the parts of your existence that clash with your utopia. Never stop chasing your utopia. Not even for the moon and the stars that may glitter and shine on your skin and in your eyes.
Monday, 5 October 2015
I am Bean
This whole poetry thing is dynamic. I don't do it for anyone really. I do it for myself. I just write, and getting it out there is just the first step towards a better understanding of myself. I can't really explain why I'm doing this anymore, but I like to think that I've created my own corner where I have my own thoughts and my own ideas that come around once in a blue (or red) moon. I am Bean. The next step in the story that is me. I'm more connected now so there's more to come if there's anyone willing to listen
Untitled 1
Lie on your back and push the weight of the world off your mind. Take the air you breathe and turn it into dust that will cloud your vision. See nothing, speak nothing. Only do as you need to. You are blind to the world and the world is blind to you, but, the world was built on layers of your skin. Peeled and drowned and beaten and shot to make metropolises and towers of ivory and gold. Sweat out the hatred. Breathe it back in. Exhale dust, and again make the world move. Shake it to its foundations and rattle its suburban windows. No fence can keep out the light absorbed by your skin, and no walls can stop the world hearing your cries. You were made to be seen in the light, not hidden by the shadows. You are thick skinned heavy boned beauty commanding every gaze. Pushing back the walls that you were born into and lifting up the world with your strength. Have pride, have shame, have blame, have love, have passion, have emotion and talent and greed and reckelss abandon. Take the whip and crack it over your head with a flick of the wrist. Send sparks flying like fireworks to the sky and beyond. Let the universe know that you were never born to be tame.