North End Station

I am used to the unyielding darkness
of blown out lightbulbs
and the lethal sway of the lamppost

but the bathroom locked with handcuffs
is a new event
in our little crumbling station

it makes me pause
and examine
and finally laugh in frustration

I make my way back to the ticket counter
and inform the cashier of my discovery
and she calmly looks at me and declares
“I do not have the keys for the handcuffs”
and continues to print tickets
as if that answer enough. 

 - Olwethu Mxoli

The girls

I want to write about the girl playing ‘kiss love’
in the soft smoke of sunset.
The skipping rope hits the asphalt
and echoes her heart’s giggle
when she rips open her love letter
and recites it to the rope’s meter.

I want to write about the girl
in her low riding jeans
laughing in the passenger seat of her boyfriend’s inherited Citi Golf.
The girl listening to the cd he spent hours burning just for this moment
when she looks at him
his face glowing from the gleam of the windshield
and she burns for him

I want to write about the girl
when she wore perfume and stilettos
danced until her feet went numb
and sweat washed away the floral notes
leaving her scent stamped on her dress.

I want to write about who she was when she was just a bud
waiting to bloom into something plump with life
juicy with laughter, dripping down the chin of a lover
in the endless summer sun.

I want to write about the girls
before they touched the ground, ripped open
and lived the rest of their lives as jam.
Something sweet spread across breakfast
but unidentifiable as them. 

 - Olwethu Mxoli

blank page 

The page begs like a hungry man 
it calls for even the faintest memory 
a water colour hung in the middle of the brightest room 
slowly decaying into transparency 

it calls for the worst memory 
the dirty one that clings to the nailbed 
and stains everything you write 
until you recoil from the mess of your own touch. 

 - Olwethu Mxoli

Missing Women 

A woman was found 
body burned beyond recognition 
rotting in a closet 
hanging from a tree 

a woman was found dead 

women are always found dead 
their names fertilize social media feeds 
and bloom into hashtags 

every photograph is filtered with the ghost of her smile 
the entire country sighs over how pretty she was
the girl who was going to be a lawyer 
an accountant 
a mother 

no meal is complete without the retelling 
her death replayed at dinner tables 
across the country 

the internet gorges on her 
until it rips indignantly at the seams 
spilling its ugly regret 
into the street. 

 - Olwethu Mxoli

The mother riddle 

I will always be a daughter to each mother
in a way I will never belong to the other
and yet in my head
and heart
they collapse into each other
until it is difficult to tell them or myself apart.

The wound
and the salt
each driving the flesh to part
and bare the bone. 

- Olwethu Mxoli


Sharing Grief

“I’m sorry.”
These words are hollow and inadequate
but they are all I have to offer.
That and hope. And prayer.

Each day announces another death
another person too sick to visit
and there’s only so much compassion
the phone can carry safely and whole to the other side.

This is a terrible emptiness
the inability to offer the comfort of a body
simply sitting next to another
sharing grief.

- Olwethu Mxoli