Mini voortrekker malfunction rests in Coronation Park.
The sad separation of the white Afrikaner bursts on broken heritage and the pioneering pride falls flat amongst pointed fingers veering off the Lord’s good word.
These ‘arm blankes’ lost their way whilst in the womb, slipping down the umbilical path to nowhere.
I wonder about the future of their culture as I shift through the camp.
I get front row to the daily fight with her step-father and witness the best of her come out in vicious spurts of blessed rage,
‘She fucked for me, not for you!’
I can see she’s tired and she is running out of options.
Dripping dirty drops off her chin and onto her two week overdue belly.
“Ek kannie meer nie..”
“Ons sal fokof uit hier. Môre sal ons uit wees”,
step-father splutters from under the car.
Exhausted promises between impotent tyres, stains in the sand and depleted pillows.
I drift off unnoticed as their vicious screams meander through the willows.
“I didn’t try to kill my child, nobody believes me.
Now I sit here alone and they judge me.”
The baba needs mothers milk, but mama lost grip with her closest ilk.
Seduced by the bottle, sipping memories of her daughters silk skin away and slipping all alone into a pile of regret.
The next day it’s the same thing to try to cure the guilt.
Until all her children are taken away, oh Lord, wondering where mommy is and what she is doing wherever she is.
This muslim seems lost. Though, she says, by being the only one in the camp she is accepted.
We talk about her man.
I don’t ask about the bandage on her arm.
Jagged teeth pierce through milk stout fumes as she cackles about how useless men can be.
We share the same year of birth.
Separated from her child and husband many years ago. They live in a city somewhere and she will most likely never see them again.
I remember feeling abandoned and forever lost when I was eight years old.
And as she slurs on, my memory goes to a place I have locked up and burnt. Suppressed it so deep it takes a while for me to
I run out of Coronation Park to breathe.
I am acutely aware of the personal connection I have in all of these individuals malfunctions.
I go back in for more.