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  Femi Osofisan
  Tanure Ojaide
  Brian Chikwava
  Hugh Hodge
  Helon Habila
  Muhammad Jalal A. Hashim
  Ogaga Ifowodo
  Edwin Gaarder
  Harry Garuba
  Toyin Adewale-Gabriel
  Zukiswa Wanner
  Ike Okonta
  Maxim Uzoatu
  George Ngwane
  Ike Anya
  E. E. Sule
  Beverley Nambozo
  Obi Nwakanma
  Matthew Dodwell
  Ikhide Ikheloa
  Afam Akeh
  Femi Oyebode
  Chika Unigwe
  Linda Chase
  Mohamed Bushara
  Wale Okediran
  Niran Ok
ewole
  Remi Raji
  Ahmed Maiwada

  Laura King

  Chuma Nwokolo



 

Hugh Hodge    
 

Text Poems

Hugh Hodge lives in the Southern Cape of South Africa. He runs 'Off the Wall', the well-subscribed gig founded by the late Richard Ishmail which is giving poetry a public presence in South Africa.
     


 
  The Bookshop

Voices murmur
as a mountain stream,
sensual.

Space, time,
silence.

Thoughts.

 

 

New Boss

I’m a virgin
to my new boss.

Yup – I know
what’s going to happen.

 

 

SMS Texts – April

17 April 2007 – 6:16am
Here is neither darkness
nor light: the city is shadow.
In the cave I saw nothing
until my eyes opened
in the dark, then revelation.
and the sound of my heart.

16 April 2007 – 10.26am
Kokerboomwood requires no woodman
nor axe. Each tree lonely
as a turnip in the arid garden
of its thirst. There I see
a windmill also lost in the dust
& light.

16 April 2007 – 9:06am
The road to Kenhardt is straight
as a Roman. But here no Centurion
led his sandaled chort.
Here the way is stony,
the green brown as carmel,
into the heights of memory
where three cranes wheel
and drift in endless horizons.

15 April 2007 – 7:00am
I am impatient.
Ache to see your eyes,
your face, the line of you,
those curves that race my heart.
Your touch, your taste,
the smell of you,
your laughter.
XXX

the sun merciless.

15 April 2007 – 5:25pm
The Kliphard face of Kathu,
iron-feasted red-earthed,
where I stoop and stop,
pick and choose blade, axe
or chisel – each jewel
glistening in the superficial world.

15 April 2007 – 12:21pm
These hills of ironstone
ring on the anvil of history.
I climb in their embrace

   
         
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