Postcard

By t. Michael Mboya

The Wedgwood Bed and Breakfast,

Melville, Johannesburg

10.10.2016

Are my eyes opening in a dream?

Or is a dream opening my eyes?

The furniture in the room floats

In still steel-grey half-light

The side table swims towards me

It brings me my cellphone

Natural light at 5:30am?

I am far away from home.

In the front garden of The Wedgwood

A bird stutters a song about loneliness

With a wave of the television remote control

I summon the seers to tell me how today will be

Here the results of the weather check

Young people battling the police

In front of an iconic university building

A bleeding priest being led into a church

A bus burning in the middle of a street

Young men looting a sportswear shop …

A stubborn dream is opening

The eyes of the young

It is another spring in Johannesburg.


Prof. T. Michael Mboya teaches in the Department of Literature, Theatre and Film Studies at Moi University, Eldoret, Kenya

@TomMichaelMboya