Submissions by whale

O Madiba! Madiba your ship has finally come to rest
Rest now, now rest, for peace was your bequest.
Humiliated, disgraced, yet in captivity you chose
By embracing your enemy, you learnt and rose.
     Insulted, assaulted, assaulting, at fault,
     Lover, Soldier, for Justice, for God’s sake!
     Stop work, break bread, water and salt
     And follow in his wake. 

O Madiba! Tata Madiba you who have overcome
A true mandala spun, a Nelson who has won
Overcoming loneliness, cowardice and fear.
Bravery but a blindness brought on by all held dear....

A rosary of olive pits
A prayer of Maaloula
One stone, kindness
One stone, love, another grace
Another joy.
A cross: a salvation.
 
Take me to the grave of St.Tekla
This virgin raped and freshly dead
Tied by a chain,
Now violence, now hatred, stolen,
Now anger, now fear
Cut our tongues.
 
Creating our martyrs,
To remind us of a peace
Neglected beside us
Reflected in water.
Tih-teh mal-chootukh
Your kingdom is come.

Bring in the wine
Green shoots on broken trees
A whispering breeze of past glories
On this river sublime.
Sing in the dusk
That brought us together

A table of friends
A shaky hand clasping yours.
Tremble words, lengthen minutes.
A wine of water born
A cask in shadows
Divining these stumbling prayers.
 
Oh bring the wine
Unravel trammelled rails
A constellation drawn on stars
A verse held in rhyme
When the sea
Beckons a wind in our sails

A dust bowl spinning from a bamboo goal
A centre that couldn't hold
A wrapped corpse floating on a bamboo raft
Set loose from a million souls
Atoms broken from worlds
And ink words burning in bamboo smoke
Never again to be heard.
 
But a heart beats in-out-in
Like breath
And what ends must begin
Like breath
And though a universe may spin
I can sit and sing  
And coalesce .