I've been quiet lately.
At school, I've been floating in and out of the classrooms not like a butterfly, but like a moth. I don't feel obviously beautiful, but I do, however, feel like a difficult beautiful. Moths are less easy to love than butterflies. As a result, I will likely vanish because I spend so much of my time beating myself against lightbulbs, those flickering astonishments being my dreams and ambitions. Anyhow, I constantly get the feeling that I'll be forgotten by and be forgetting my friends very, very soon. The prospect of flying away to another country does that to you. The present ends up becoming less and less important because it becomes but a mere waiting period for the future. It's been difficult planting my feet to the concrete because I know how wonderful it is be one with the sky. Yeah, I think I know what's that like; I know I know what's that like: the sky is blue. Yeah, my favourite colour is red but god! don't we all need a little splash of blue from time to time?
I'm sorry for the ranting. You see, I've been rather quite lately. Gaborone hasn't said a lot recently either.
Though, if I'm being entirely honest it's not like Gaborone is a particularly loud city. The rampant acacias whisper platitudes and not secrets. The scorching sun sets fire to nothing. The old woman in front of you at the bus station moves slowly and talks loudly but you never hear what she's saying. Really, the most noise you'll ever get out of Gaborone is a screeching mini-bus horn pelting out against... yes, the concrete. Combis drive as such amazing speeds that they seem to want to escape the ground. And I think they do. Many of us want to fly. Many of us know how wonderful it is to be one with the sky. Yeah we think we know what that's like; we know we know what's that like: the sky is blue. But the world keeps saying out favourite colour should be red, but god! don't I need a little splash of blue from time to time?
Okay, let me stop being so abstract now.
In the last two years of my life here in Gaborone, I spent quite a bit of time combi'ing it out to various places of colour and adventure. I have rather lovely memories of journeying the small grand distance from my school to the University of Botswana in order to have a little bit of intellectual fun with the varsity debaters. There was even a brief hurricane period of being wheeled to the Botswana Accountancy College to meet with their debate society. I was always the slightly awkward high-school debater posing as a seasoned veteran, but my posing wasn't so bad. I'd been invited to share in those ambitious spaces by debater-friends studying at the tertiary level. If they thought I knew what I was doing, then it's worth assuming that must have been the case. Okay, so I didn't always know what I was doing, I never knew what I was doing- but they humoured me anyways and taught me how to fight with ideas with a little bit more vibrancy and spirit, so I was happy nonetheless.
There was also, of course, my life in poetry, which continues to this day. In 'Adventures in Gaborone No. 1' I talked a lot about this being a city of poets. I still believe this is true. Finally breathing in Gaborone's air has allowed me to rapidly evolve into one of those poets, and I've even gained an amateurish level of respect from some of my bigger and better senior writers.When this first started happening, I loved it. Sometimes after reciting one of my pieces, I'd get asked how old I was and feverishly, but not really feverishly, responded with a nervous, but not really nervous, 'I'm seventeen.' This did wonders for my self-esteem. A year later I'm often asked that same question, but saying 'I'm eighteen' doesn't have that same kind of wunderkind relish and spark.
I mean, we have to grow up at some point right?
Maybe not. As you may have noticed, I spend a lot of time living in my memories. Writing poetry is, of course, an exercise in preservation rather than creation. I suppose this is why writing verse comes relatively easy to me (editing, is of course another matter), because I have a penchant of looking over my shoulder and glancing back towards yesterday, even though my foot is firmly set on tomorrow.
Hey! Do you remember the lovely girl I mentioned who showed me what a wonder Gaborone is?
She's coming to visit.
This makes me astonishingly happy.
Even if I haven't exactly been able to stay who I was while she disappeared.
But that's a different story for another day...
Yes, as usual, I'll get around to writing about it...
Such things are my specialty:
Adventures about yesterday for tomorrow, written today.
At school, I've been floating in and out of the classrooms not like a butterfly, but like a moth. I don't feel obviously beautiful, but I do, however, feel like a difficult beautiful. Moths are less easy to love than butterflies. As a result, I will likely vanish because I spend so much of my time beating myself against lightbulbs, those flickering astonishments being my dreams and ambitions. Anyhow, I constantly get the feeling that I'll be forgotten by and be forgetting my friends very, very soon. The prospect of flying away to another country does that to you. The present ends up becoming less and less important because it becomes but a mere waiting period for the future. It's been difficult planting my feet to the concrete because I know how wonderful it is be one with the sky. Yeah, I think I know what's that like; I know I know what's that like: the sky is blue. Yeah, my favourite colour is red but god! don't we all need a little splash of blue from time to time?
I'm sorry for the ranting. You see, I've been rather quite lately. Gaborone hasn't said a lot recently either.
Though, if I'm being entirely honest it's not like Gaborone is a particularly loud city. The rampant acacias whisper platitudes and not secrets. The scorching sun sets fire to nothing. The old woman in front of you at the bus station moves slowly and talks loudly but you never hear what she's saying. Really, the most noise you'll ever get out of Gaborone is a screeching mini-bus horn pelting out against... yes, the concrete. Combis drive as such amazing speeds that they seem to want to escape the ground. And I think they do. Many of us want to fly. Many of us know how wonderful it is to be one with the sky. Yeah we think we know what that's like; we know we know what's that like: the sky is blue. But the world keeps saying out favourite colour should be red, but god! don't I need a little splash of blue from time to time?
Okay, let me stop being so abstract now.
In the last two years of my life here in Gaborone, I spent quite a bit of time combi'ing it out to various places of colour and adventure. I have rather lovely memories of journeying the small grand distance from my school to the University of Botswana in order to have a little bit of intellectual fun with the varsity debaters. There was even a brief hurricane period of being wheeled to the Botswana Accountancy College to meet with their debate society. I was always the slightly awkward high-school debater posing as a seasoned veteran, but my posing wasn't so bad. I'd been invited to share in those ambitious spaces by debater-friends studying at the tertiary level. If they thought I knew what I was doing, then it's worth assuming that must have been the case. Okay, so I didn't always know what I was doing, I never knew what I was doing- but they humoured me anyways and taught me how to fight with ideas with a little bit more vibrancy and spirit, so I was happy nonetheless.
There was also, of course, my life in poetry, which continues to this day. In 'Adventures in Gaborone No. 1' I talked a lot about this being a city of poets. I still believe this is true. Finally breathing in Gaborone's air has allowed me to rapidly evolve into one of those poets, and I've even gained an amateurish level of respect from some of my bigger and better senior writers.When this first started happening, I loved it. Sometimes after reciting one of my pieces, I'd get asked how old I was and feverishly, but not really feverishly, responded with a nervous, but not really nervous, 'I'm seventeen.' This did wonders for my self-esteem. A year later I'm often asked that same question, but saying 'I'm eighteen' doesn't have that same kind of wunderkind relish and spark.
I mean, we have to grow up at some point right?
 |
| Well you see, I would grow up, but the two kids in front of my sister and me are so darn adorable that I can't imagine looking like that horrid afro-dude in the background hiding his horrid afro-dude face. |
Maybe not. As you may have noticed, I spend a lot of time living in my memories. Writing poetry is, of course, an exercise in preservation rather than creation. I suppose this is why writing verse comes relatively easy to me (editing, is of course another matter), because I have a penchant of looking over my shoulder and glancing back towards yesterday, even though my foot is firmly set on tomorrow.
Hey! Do you remember the lovely girl I mentioned who showed me what a wonder Gaborone is?
She's coming to visit.
This makes me astonishingly happy.
Even if I haven't exactly been able to stay who I was while she disappeared.
But that's a different story for another day...
Yes, as usual, I'll get around to writing about it...
Such things are my specialty:
Adventures about yesterday for tomorrow, written today.
