A TREAT FROM MY MOTHER By Lebo Mazibuko I run towards my mother who arrives home

A TREAT FROM MY MOTHER
By Lebo Mazibuko
I run towards my mother who arrives home, plastics in hand She has come from madam’s kitchen
Where backyards have pools filled with blue waters,
and their airs acquainted with silence
Their children enjoy feasts three times daily
Cooked by my mother’s own hands, of course
“In those plastics that you hold Mama, I hope you have those treats you promised me:
two jawbreaker fireballs and those cheesy fluffy puffs”
My mother she said to wait till the week has lapsed Today, is Friday
She enters the house and collapses on a bed that’s only familiar with her own warmth,
lonely
Tongue greased with bitterness
Throat inflamed with rage,
weary
Mama, she said rest for us is found in graves
Her funeral will be the birthday she wished for
She will be dressed in expensive silk
They will gather the neighbors and slaughter a cow
They will write speeches and sing to her
They will toast, before drowning themselves in sour drink After all, Mama deserves a good party
The books she places before me do not placate me Digging through these plastics, only maize and milk, AGAIN, and again.
“Mama, what have you brought home for me besides your tired face?”
“Why do you bother to rise at dawn, Shift between railways, chasing trains,
Your collar weighed down from your sweat
And at the end of it all, your word to me you cannot keep?
Mama, why did you not buy me my two jawbreaker fireballs and cheesy puffs
Because you promised!”
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