The Promise of Memory

Michael Weeder

• Publisher: African Perspectives Publishing
• Year: 2023
• Print ISBN: 9781990976766
• eBook ISBN: 9781990976773
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: African Poetry
• Index: Literature

This selection of poems - covering the years from 1980 to the present day - expresses the poets personal attempts at making sense of the everyday, ordinary difficulties, and the small victories of life. The offering emphasises, sometimes in an exploratory suggestiveness, how differences should not be divisive and that they form part of the range of ways in which we belong to - and are of - each other.

Glossary

I know where me from
familia:	family
goema drum:	a hand-held drum made from a small wooden wine barrel of which one end is covered with the skin of an animal. It is popularly associated with the traditional New Year’s Carnival held in Cape Town.
I-and-I:	We. Often used in place of ‘you and I’ or ‘we’ among Rastafari to indicate the oneness and unity of people
#SAMarch4Gaza
Wathint' Abafazi, Wathint' Imbokodo'
	Xhosa: You strike the women, you strike the rock. These words are generally associated with the Women’s March to the Union Buildings on 9 August 1956 to protest against the pass laws under Apartheid.
Soldier of Tambo
tjalie buchu	colloquial Afrikaans word for swaddling blanket an aromatic plant indigenous to the Cape region, used for medicinal purposes. Botanical name: agathosma betulina
Morawiese kend	Moravian child; ‘ kend’ is a phonetic representation based on colloquial pronunciation of the Afrikaans word ‘kind’ meaning child
Groot Mense	Literally translated from Afrikaans it means ‘big people / adults.’ It is also used to refer to ‘elders’ which is the way that it is being used in this context.
koor-dans	praise dance. A form of worship that has its origins in the Pentecostal Churches of Southern Africa. It is no doubt influenced by the trance or healing dances of the indigenous San people.
Steve Bantu Biko said
Abafundisi:	preachers
One Love
O se boloke sechaba	save our nation (this is a line in the new South African anthem)
Padkos coloured by history
bredie:	stew
umngqusho:	a dish made of samp with sugar beans, onions and potatoes
pens-en-pootjies	tripe and trotters
skuins lê	literally translated it means ‘to lie sideways’; used colloquially it means ‘to take a nap’
babalaas	a hangover, taken from the Zulu word 'isibhabalazi'.
athaan	Islamic call to prayer
barakat	Arabic for blessing. Used customarily to refer to food or cakes given to guests to take home after a festive gathering.
Kifyaat kos	a basic meal of meat, carrots and peas served at the conclusion of a Muslim funeral
gedatmelk	a sweet, milky drink served at Muslim prayer meetings following a funeral
The autumn of love
Ou ballie	slang for old man and in this context, it is used to suggest old-fashioned ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Introduction
• Preface
• I know where me from
• Coloured girls
• An Elegy for Khwezi
• Beyond the Night
• #SAMarch4Gaza: A Prayer
• Soldier of Tambo
• Sathima sang
• Lenten ash
• A letter to my father
• Steve Bantu Biko said
• When the Hills Were Dark
• A drive-by question in two movements
• One Love
• Yesterday
• Padkos coloured by history
• Mixed Blood
• The autumn of Love
• On our wedding day
• September child
• So Much to Declare
• Ocean View
• The land is dark
• Flight of the Spear
• How Come?
• Like Langston
• When Madiba visited Ashton
• Just outside Ashton
• A Poet’s life
• Biko
• Now Is Not the Time
• Uncoupling
• Leaving
• Eina
• I like my coffee
• If I was in Cuba today
• Wealth
• Where the river flows
• Thanayi
• Brutus, Siempre
• You will never die
• Alchemy
• In the name of all
• For the beauty of it all
• This poem
• Uncle Kathy
• The naming of things
• Singing, we rise
• Your hands
• The Blue Sky
• Kyle’s piano
• Camissa of the clandestine
• A Psalm of Solidarity
• Jericho Walls
• O sistas of the land
• A Letter from Factreton, June 1986
• The dance of falling stars
• Promise
• Pandemic piety
• Glossary