Sunday, 17 November 2013

I saw your mother by Jeremy Cronin

  1. I saw your mother
  2. with two guards
  3. through a glass plate
  4. for one quarter hour
  5. on the day that you died

  1. ‘Extra visit, special favour’
  2. I was told, and warned
  3. “The visit will be stopped
  4. if politics is discussed.
  5. Verstaan – understand!?’

  1. on the day that you died
  2. I couldn’t place
  3. my arm around her,
  4. around your mother
  5. when she sobbed

  1. Fifteen minutes up
  2. I was led
  3. back to the workshop
  4. Your death, my wife,
  5. one crime they managed
  6. not to perpetrate
  7. on the day that you died
(Jeremy Cronin is a member of the South African Communist Party. He was arrested and send to jail. He spent some time on Robben Island. This poem is about his wife’s death while he was in prison.)
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeremy_Cronin
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