Seven Poems of Dennis Brutus

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Horror Is All Around Us

Brutus Poem, 10/1/09  

Dennis: "Written after midnight, February 8."

Guernica, Sharpeville, Shatila, Gaza—  

Horror is all around us.  

Death, destruction, mashed corpses,  

it is all around us: commonplace.  

Astonishingly, humanity erupts  

in such virulent excesses against itself.  

There is no limit to our ingenuity  

in the service of torture and carnage.  

Astonishingly too, we have wells  

of pity, mercy, goodness.  

We can find ways to heal wounds—  

devices to repair injury.  

Miraculously, somewhere, we have compassion.

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How a Poem Begins  

You see a tree,  

a mountain,  

or a flower;  

something in it moves you;  

it sparks a thought  

or an emotion;  

it is how a poem begins:  

not in a decision  

or conscious choice.  

Some might call it inspiration,  

others, however, would not.  

Dennis Brutus – How a Poem Begins, August 12, 2008

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I Am a Rebel  

Dennis: "A 'found' poem; based on a speech by Yassir Arafat at the UN 34 years ago. Arafat, at that time, was one of the great Palestinian liberation fighters."

I am a rebel and freedom is my cause:  

Many of you have fought similar struggles,  

therefore you must join my cause.  

My cause is a dream of freedom,  

and you must help me make my dream a reality.  

For why should I not dream and hope?  

Is not revolution making reality of hopes?  

Let us work together so that my dream may be fulfilled,  

that I may return with my people out of exile  

to live in one democracy, in peace.  

Is not my dream a noble one,  

worthy to stand beside freedom struggles everywhere?

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I Lie in the Dark  

I lie in the dark  

and beg forgiveness  

from whatever gods there may be,  

or fates, or unseen hearers  

for my follies.  

God, what a lousy lover I was—  

such a lousy, selfish, ignorant,  

naïve lover I was.  

Above all, selfish,  

relishing only my own narrow selfish pleasure,  

ignorant of the pleasure I might give,  

and in giving,  

give myself delight.  

Dennis Brutus – August 30, 2008, Durban, South Africa

I Salute the Jacarandas Anyway – In Memory of Mahmoud Darwish

I salute the Jacarandas anyway  

Whatever else the world may offer,  

Offer for our praise  

Or our opprobrium,  

I salute the Jacarandas anyway.  

"It will be as if I never lived.  

There will be no trace of me,  

There will be no sign of me remembered.  

It will be as if I never lived.  

No trace of me will remain.  

All will be as if nothing had been."  

What will it matter if nothing remains?  

You will have breathed the fresh morning air  

And walked the dewy morning grass,  

And will have asserted, for once, your being.  

And I will salute the Jacarandas once more.  

Dennis Brutus  

October 3, 2008 – For Mahmoud Darwish, 12th Poetry Africa, UKZN Elizabeth Sneddon Theatre

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In the Stupendously Complex

In the stupendously complex  

interactions of infinite intelligence,  

I am an infinitesimal cell  

interacting with my fellows  

in a sempiternal dance of axons and dendrites.  

I and this red oak exist and interact,  

cells of the central divine intelligence.  

Some of us are diseased and suffering,  

gradual processes of healing  

may take centuries.

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Exile

Dennis: "Influenced by Dante’s banishment"  

Brutus poem, 18/2/09

Exile, exile,  

you are a bitter word.  

I eat you with my bread.  

I drink you with my tea.  

You are the bitter word  

that makes the world bitter to me.  

The stars look down,  

they see the world,  

they see a place  

where I cannot be.  

Exile, exile,  

you are a bitter word.  

I eat you with my bread,  

I drink you with my tea.  

Exile, exile,  

you make the stars bitter to me.