Song of the /Xam

The cry of the moon as the sun's first knife-blade
rips open her belly full of children -
"Sun, spare my children..."

then it is morning.
Such a piercing shriek that begins each day.
Then there is the sound of the stars.

Tsau! Tsau! confounding the eyes of the springbok
to help us in our hunting.
Because the stars are whole clans

striding across the skies, hunter moon,
star-mother leading her star-child,
and Kunn, the rainmaker, who was of our family

danced till his heart fell down into the water pit
so the rainbull, legs in columns, became docile,
soft haired, trotted after him across dry plains.

We know to leave no tracks when we die.
Each our own wind
to cleanse our footsteps from the earth,

our own cloud, to reflect our particular light,
and the moon, emptied, dips her head to catch us
in the hollow between her horns.

We know when to leave our mother, grown helpless
behind in her hut, firewood beside her,
her roof open.

We know, when we kill, our wind grows cold
because wind is one with the man
and the star it blows from grows cold also.

And we know devious Mantis, creator of trouble
creator of the moon from a feather heís used
to wipe the gall-blindness from his eye

who rises from hot coals

where he was writhing, blackening
newly feathered, cock of the walk, Mantis, called
Kaggen, who changes the world by dreaming it.

O Order "Homecoming" O Home O

Poems Copyright © Jeni Couzyn 1999.
Illustrations Copyright © Cecil Skotnes 1999. All rights reserved.
Legal notice: No part of this document may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise without written permission from the copyright owners and the publisher. Jeni Couzyn and Claire Weissman Wilks have asserted their rights under section 77 of the Copyright Design and Patents Act 1988, to be identified as the author and illustrator of this work.