BY BAROLONG SEBONI
The Mall
is an eye awakening
from the honey-heavy dew
of slumber that had settled
on its eyelashes:
the brilliant rays of the golden promises
skying the horizon.
The Mall
yawns ajar;
glassy-steel dentures open
beckon you to come-in-and-browse.
It is the tricky, sticky tongue of an adder
jetting out to catch the unsuspecting fly.
Telephones tinkling
tills clinking
with tikkie-box precision,
receiving cents sinking.
The Mall is the sound of lips:
kissing lovers, kissing brothers
pursing together into whispers of gossip;
office girls with telephone tone,
hissing in switchboard frequencies
It is the pouted lips of fat businessmen,
gaming on you to offer a smack on the cheek
before you turn the other…
It is the voice
of the Daily Newsense
our-one-and-only,
Radio Botswana the station of stagnation
The Shrill voice
Of that only man
standing by the Capitol Cinema
saying sooth, prophesying
to the wind, the birds
the hustle-bustle of city Gaborone
The Mall
is the scrawny hand
of that grandma,
cracked like the disused clay-pot
or parched terrain no longer able to
support grass,
begging for Pula.
She,
warm in her rug of poverty,
crouching against the stone-cold grey monument
leaning on memories of forgotten regiments
who fought foreign wars.
It is the nifty hand of the urchin:
Mahlalela dispossessed
picking pocket;
wealth repossessed
picking noses
pricking consciences…
The Mall is the neon twilight;
an electric eye blinking
on-off-on
watching you,
watching me,
watching…
Petlo Literary Arts 