Talk the Walk.
Freshly showered aromas of cheap parfumerie
Filtering out from rotund Black faced White teethed men,
Bulging out of the Melville B&B strip,
Holding predictably poised wheeled black baggage.
Breathe deeper red rose bushes, lining the wall.
Tainted with the fumes of petrol,
A river of vehicles affronting all senses.
The kotch-green merc that carries the face of the man who smiles at me,
His stony-faced “staff” that he will lean on all day, alongside him.
And the brown bus-driver, who also smiled on that day,
Trafficking Jozi all-sorts to their daily destinations
People blackberry-breakfasting in the stale rusk, corner café
Bob Dylan has taken centre stage in the bookshop window
A4 telling all book readers of Monday night scrabble at Nuno's
Funky waitress adverts at the newly renovated, anticipated Fifa-fans bar
Everyone trying to ride the Melville sub-station Gautrain band-wagon.
I am back to the world of found objects,
Using them to spell survive the suffering of numerous losses
A silver ghoen, full of shine underneath its grimy surface
Yellow and pink sunflower sun-seed tin, rusted with untold stories
Dr Long’s long-lasting satisfying love – No Smell Chinese Brush.
Black bins line the street as though waiting for those who
Rummage through other people’s classified debris.
Dogs with barbed teeth and vicious barks
If they cannot roam free why should you?
I walk on, mindful of my personal gps, which re-maps the route
Where I unwittingly painted a bloodied self portrait on canvassed tar, With a finely selected sharply stoned save your life paintbrush
No-one can rob me of these ground-swell, sound-smells -
Spelling, scrabbling, shrieking, scintillating, Ayoba Jozi Sync-chroni-City.
©Suzy Bernstein
May 2010.