A Poem
By Sumeya Gasa
Mother, it’s cold out here.
The streets are clean only to be tainted with my blackness.
I feel wrong.
Mother, I still haven’t found a place to stay.
My friends have been using false English names
To appeal to property owners.
‘Sumeya’, I don’t have to change.
There’s a certain privilege to it.
Mother,
Thank you for my name.
Mother,
The place they put us up in for two weeks
Could cover 6 months rent in a regular apartment.
We have more immediate needs.
My heart is broken
Has been broken
But I’m glad to be away from you now
So I can cry freely away from your tormented gaze.
Mother,
I’ve found a place to stay.
It’s really cold here
When I breathe, I can see my breath.
It forms a cloud before me
Reminding me that despite the cold,
Despite the fact that I am actually dead
I still have air in my lungs.
Air that touches all the scars inside
Forcing my heart into further recluse.
Mother,
These bitches are crazy.
Literally.
I sleep with my door locked.
We’re all suffering a neurosis of sorts.
Removed. Racialised. Wrong.
I can’t blame them.
Mother,
I’m homeless.
An acquaintance took me in when none of my friends would.
Mother,
We found a new place!
It’s lovely!
I think I’m happy now.
Oh, it’s so lovely!
And I’ve got a king-sized bed!
It’s furnished all the way from bed to teaspoons!
We keep thinking we’re in a dream!
Mother,
I love my new job.
It’s exactly what I’ve always wanted to do.
Stories that matter.
People.
People like me
And youth with an intense amount of passion
A burning sense of indignation
In search of justice and equity.
They give me life.
Mother,
I’m tired.
I’m drained, exhausted.
I’m heaving and bleeding.
I’ve got a red hot water bottle that keeps my hands and feet warm
But I still can’t sleep.
The therapist got me on antidepressants
And anxiety meds and sleeping pills.
I still can’t sleep.
I have to mix them with nurofen.
Intoxicated to near death
Only to rise the next morning,
Weeping inconsolably.
Mother,
I quit the antidepressants
And all the other meds.
I’ve been dead for 3 weeks and I didn’t even know.
My clothes are hanging off my bones
And food tastes new and too strong.
On the bright side I can drink a lot more water now.
Mother,
I met a family
Of two families.
Such beautiful people
With flaws that remind me of yours.
So giving, so kind.
So little but so giving.
They bring me closer to the meaning of my skin
And the emptiness of my lungs
In a city that aims to remove us from the white gaze
A city that is hell bent on making zombified slaves of us
And refuses to see us after curfew.
Mother,
They’ve started randomly searching black men in Obz.
Students.
Who live there.
Who ought to be there.
They’ve brought me closer to the meaning of my skin
The volatile nature of pseudo privilege
The fallacy of house negro and clever blacks
Assimilant blacks
Chicken Georges
And blacks who vote DA.
Mother,
I’m angry.
With zero fucks to give
And a mind of fire.
But mostly, I’m weary
And afraid,
Everyday.
Never knowing when or what
Could send me back into the crushing,
Smothering stranglehold of depression.
Mother,
It’s cold out here.
It’s cold outside.
It’s cold in the colony
And I’m 2 seconds away from getting noosed to a tree.
[…] Telephonic Conversations That I Will Never Have With My Mother – Sumeya Gasa […]