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Poetry

	Gert Strydom
	PROFILE About me Friends (13) Poetry (1888) Prose (37) Photography (5)

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Gert Strydom, 9 december 2013

When the force of strong conviction

When the force of strong conviction
is overwhelming and oppressing
as if others in their own interests
want to drive you away,
from this place, from this country
which you hold high and holy
when you are only seeking an own place in the sun
and do also grant others such a place
its as if you are protected,
as if God folds His hand around you.

When a human being is for many almost a god
and they are convinced that he brings a kind of peace
with his rainbow nation
but job opportunities are denied
for every one that is white,
on his command the Church Street bomb explodes
and innocent children, women and men
pay the price for that decision
then a person realises
that even the time of Nelson Mandela is determined
by the God and judge of the universe.

[References: In his book “long walk to freedom” Nelson Mandela admits to giving the command to explode the bomb in Church Street. “The Church Street bombing was a car bomb attack on 20 May 1983 by Umkhonto we Sizwe, the military wing of the African National Congress (ANC), in Pretoria. The bomb exploded on Church Street at 4:30pm on a Friday. The bombing killed 19 people and wounded 217. The Church Street bombing attack was commanded by Aboobaker Ismail, authorized under the leadership of Oliver Tambo and Joe Slovo, with the knowledge and approval of Nelson Mandela. The Church Street bombing murdered both black and white people, and far more civilians than police or military.”]

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Gert Strydom, 6 december 2013

From the days of yonder

From the days of yonder
you did prepare our garden beautifully
and like a English teagarden
planted several flowers together
that they can spread
their magical fragrances and colours throughout any season

and now that summer is coming

and God lets His rain pour down
our garden has become a piece of paradise.

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Gert Strydom, 5 december 2013

Sometimes I do ask

Sometimes I do ask for a bit of mercy from you,
to hesitate when you do not immediately understand
and to keep at mind
that wherever life goes

I do love you out of the depth of my heart.

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Gert Strydom, 4 december 2013

Like a fragile cosmos flower

Like a fragile cosmos flower
you came unexpectedly into my life,
before I knew it I did fall in love
and now you turn my days over and over.

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Gert Strydom, 3 december 2013

As a mere child

As a mere child I played the marigold game
and pulled off and did divide
the yellow leave one after the other
but now that I have got you
I do not want to determine your love like this.

Everything in life I want to share with you,
I cannot and do not want to forget you
and what does flowers know about true love?

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Gert Strydom, 2 december 2013

When the grey days of winter

When the grey days of winter loose their colour
and the golden sun at springtime sits in the hazy blue
then I can hear weavers, sparrows and doves
that does twitter and coo
and then you are in your glory my wife

when you laugh happy like the summer-sun,
when your fingers pull out weeds
and plant seedlings of new flowers

and like a goddess from mythology
you then hold the green
of your own small world in your hands

and then I do realise
that our love also is continually sprouting
and do flower without questions,
that the days of our lives
stretch into each season
and up into distance

but that our love is perpetual
and can even flower in the worst winter.

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Gert Strydom, 29 november 2013

I cannot forget

I cannot forget
how unnoticed
for a week we follow tracks

where women terrorists
go to a native village
to trade their bodies

and they bring back food

and leave weapons, ammunition, landmines
and hand-grenades at that place

how that women
break away unnoticed from that village
and plant landmines in a road

and a farmer and his wife and child
with their pickup truck lie blown to bits

and I wonder if those people
did not also want a life?

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Gert Strydom, 29 november 2013

In the dark night I load rockets

In the dark night I load rockets
and stand away
while they are fired against the enemy
and I see them drawing red lines
with long flames
burning beyond them

and its like as a child
when I went to the drive-in
and saw how they shoot men off
into space,
on the way to the moon

but these rockets are aimed
at T55 tanks and BTR armoured cars
and soldiers of the Cuban and FAPLA enemy
that burn in unquenched flames

when at a distance the deadly arrows rain down
and I can smell the fragrance of death,
gunpowder and prosperous
on the evening breeze
while I watch the fireworks.

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Gert Strydom, 28 november 2013

Only once in a lifetime

There is a kind of flower
that only once a year
opens her buds
and when the moon rises full and bright
shows her colours
while people await
the appears of her flowers
in silence in a temple
as if she is holy.

Only once in a lifetime
there is a girl that is like an angel
without any match

and that woman
I have found in you.

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Gert Strydom, 28 november 2013

Night

The joy that you bring
when we are alone with one white candle
glowing in our room

while you draw me into a hot embrace
covers all other things,
even sand, grass, flowers and trees
that is outside,

causes me to want the sun
to leave the blue sky
to have you near to me
and to dream while you are here.

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10 - 30 - 100

Other poems: For now and for always, The temptation of being near to her, Your walking away is measured in watt, In the garden (ABECEDARIUM), Just for a moment it is there, There are people, Unknowing we may be living in a war zone, Holiday, I yearn for the secrets of nature (sonnet), At 52 the nuts of my country are stripped, A strange dream (triolet), The beach, the morning, Where star systems do disappear in the nought (sonnet), Come to my flower garden, Warriors of the civil service, This morning the sky glitters blue, You must not show any fear, My dear loving God, Sad tidings, Morning, Mirror image, The sun hangs orange red, Divorce V, Divorce IV (Espinela), Divorce III, Divorce II (cavatina), Divorce, Respite, At times we are only set on passing (American sonnet), The peach tree, The gardener, The old guitar (cavatina), Dear Lord God, Still life, Two sides to everything (cavatina), I have missed my country, The sardine run, He lies stretched out in the sun, Africa, There’s no other country, When death’s fingers do me touch, I wonder where is an untouched place that firmly does stand, You never came, I am afraid, The silent countdown, Without matter, Dare you character?, Once I wrote a kind of happy song (Orléans rondel prime), There is no other saviour, Alone we come into the world (for my mom on mother’s day), With hunger in your eyes, Please do forgive, Hoba West Meteor, When I do consider how my time is spent, I see him doing carpentry, When the two of us met, John Phillip, On Pretoria (Italian sonnet), Return, Cecil John Rhodes (Italian sonnet) (in answer to Rudyard Kipling), Afterwards, I walk in the veldt near to Majuba hillock, Vain are the words and deeds that are mine (Rubiyat sonnet), When I do find no place of peace (sonnet), Why I remember the Anglo-Boer war (John Dee sonnet), Lord, only in Your footsteps (Persian / Rubiyat quatrain), On a night, Far too quickly time rushes on (Persian /Rubiyat quatrain), Like any other person, She lives beautiful (sonnet), Where this world is but a grain of sand, On the day of my birth, The crucifixion of the Son of God, Today my heart is full of joy, A prayer (Sonnet), On my birthday, My heart has gone quite in me (Persian / Rubiyat quatrain), Come to me, Soldier: yesterday, At this place I have been before (sonnet), There had been a kind of loneliness, When the early the morning does begin (cavatina), Constantly I am astonished, When I hold you tight, Life is a gift, Bus trip at night, I have not seen the spark of life, Kamikaze, Lucifer at sunrise, The things in a town, When from me she is out of sight, How chilly like winter, Some times, I love you, Long Beach, As my eyes gaze into the dark night, I see her dancing gaily, Right against the morass, African September, A room in the past, The secret room, It had been a hell of spring with the sun hanging scorching, The marsh, For my darling, with New Year, The old year, Today people are not interested, South Africa is also my country, In this distant country, What fanciful lives we lead, As if they are beacons, You are my darling (sonnet), On Christmas, Last night I dreamt of you, Where are we now?, I had dreamt of you, At night the mind plays its tricks, Inside you and I dance, One Military Hospital, Something about a bird in a tree, While the year hangs skeleton, I gave my love to you, No other painting, Field of maize, The red arum lilies, Would my words, When the front door, At dusk, Child, Cry, Maybe 4, Maybe 3, Maybe 2, To be us, Photocopy machine, I do love Africa, While everything is turning brown outside, The crumbling man, My small Jack Russell dog, With self contempt I stand in the veldt, The fallen Cuban soldier, There is a time when night sneaks in, After the farm invasions in Zimbabwe, The small redbreast sings and dances, I love you, Walls, A child is a strange thing, Baby lies so fast asleep, It is a pitch-dark night, Hecuba, A pastor,

Latest items:

Poetry

When the force of strong conviction

From the days of yonder

Sometimes I do ask

Like a fragile cosmos flower

As a mere child

When the grey days of winter

I cannot forget

In the dark night I load rockets

Only once in a lifetime

Night

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