subject, and in South Africa it has given breath and pulse to socio-political concepts and ideologies that gave birth to the current country. As if to assert my point, Mbulelo Mzamane says James Matthews ' poetry was not influenced by black consciousness, but it has, in fact, influenced black consciousness. Lesego Rampolokeng declares that he was introduced to black consciousness not by Steve Biko or Franz Fanon, rather through the poetry of Mafika Gwala— a sentiment echoed by Mxolisi Nyezwa about Ingoapele Madingoane ' s poetry.
Not even the politician can ignore or surpass poetry ' s impact in the antiapartheid struggle. The current president, Jacob Zuma, recently acknowledged the role played by poets such as James Matthews and Mafika Gwala in inspiring young people“ to surge forward and keep the flame of the anti-apartheid struggle burning”. He, however, missed an opportunity to locate and reassert today ' s poet— something former statesman Thabo Mbeki attempted to do when he identified the poetry of Mazisi Kunene as fundamental in the voyage of reclaiming the African renaissance in the current day.
Two decades into the democratic experiment, central beliefs that the new political dispensation claimed to stand for— that is equality, diversity and free expression— are arguably under threat. Numbers of citizens who register to vote are gradually dropping, revealing that young people have lost hope in politics. The yawning cleavage between our highly-rated constitution and its implementation— or lack thereof— reminds us that laws and legal processes are never self-executive. Without accountable human agency and an institution to activate them, they will remain nothing beyond a piece of paper. Ethnic intolerance and xenophobic attacks strongly suggest that humanity is somewhat out of balance. Heart-sagging corruption and the mismanagement of government institutions also turn liberation into a mirage before billions and billions of hungry and caged citizens. Poetry can, surely, claim a better function in the current times than ever before.
It will be absurd for me, or anyone else, to prescriptively dictate what and how individual poets must write, especially the elitist clique who are taught to prematurely censure and reject poetry on the basis of its political relevance. Imposed obligations overweigh poetry, putting creativity in danger of a possible fatigue. That said, my conscious does not allow me to write about flowers, stars and pets while unjust and inhumane forces slaughter the innocent. I write about anything, in whatsoever way, as long as that anything doesn ' t hinder or obscure my reality or reality of my environment and times. There is absolutely no way that poetry, for me, can promenade in luxury of mumbling while humanity is at stake. It is from this angle WB Yeats can get my nod in his rejection of the aestheticism of“ art for art ' s sake”, as he argues that literature must be the expression of conviction.
www. megaartists. co. za Aug-Sep 2015 Page 28