Behind a Stone Wall

stands the rest of my father, carrying  
a book with pages we will never turn. 
We had buried him in a casket 
lined with newspapers to keep his face 
annoyed, because freedom is immortal,  
he thought. He holds the book 
like a slab of concrete  
we should build the rest of our lives on, 
like someone saying, while lifting the marble  
off a tomb: here’s what’s to be dealt with. 
He looks like himself battling a plough  
into submission. At the sound of his voice  
our dog whimpers, and I hear it  
scrape the bottom of a lower door at back  
which father used when he came home late. 
When l awake, I will myself back to sleep.  
He hobbles to me and places the book 
in my small hands, then turns around 
and disappears without another look.

Rethabile Masilo
    

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