Business is as usual
at the other end
of the artificial divide
where Khayelitsha gets
to be a metaphor
for the Rainbow Nation’s
ups and downs.

Business is as usual
and I mind my own
looking here and there
checking what has
changed and what
has not.

New housing developments
one side by side
what once could have
been a river stream
now a streaming dump.

New billboards and signs too
which I eagle-eye like
my English teacher mother-late
would have taken a red pen to.

Freshen… in big letters
on one such billboard
some product that relieves
occasional constipation
and their spelling is not smelling.

Out Khayelitsha-way
here there is a BMW club
and the Whizz ICT Centre too
is there still just 1 cop
per 1675 of the citizens?

I am fresh enough
a peaceful bus junket
for Burn Fire’s
reggae and poetry all-nighter.

Business is as usual
a night out under the stars,
Site C Khayelitsha, 30 December 2017
see “One cop for 3000 people” (Cape Argus, July 10 2013); and
‘Police badly failing rape victims in Khayelitsha’ Cape Times, January 30 2014.