If I Could Sing : Selected Poems

by Kgositsile, Keroapetse

• ISBN13: 9780795701269
• ISBN10: 0795701268
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2002-09-01
• Publisher: Kwela Books

Summary

South African poet Keorapetse "Willie" Kgositsile has selected 69 poems from six previously published collections as well as new work. The poems, written over four decades, many while in exile, explore a wide spectrum of emotions and a need to participate in the struggle to liberate the poet's land of birth. In the stunning original rhythms of the poems, the subtle influence of jazz and the Setswana language, the poet's mother tongue, can be heard.

Author Biography

Keroapetse Kgositsile has had six books of poetry published, in addition to numerous poems in literary journals and anthologies, and has been the recipient of a number of literary awards, the latest being the Gwendolyn Brooks Prize for Poetry 2000. Over the last four decades he has been awarded the National Endowment for the Arts poetry award, the New York Council of the Arts poetry award, and the Rockefeller Foundation poetry grant. He has been teaching courses in literature, African literature, African American literature and creative writing in various United States and African institutions since his first post at Sarah Lawrence College in New York in 1969. Other works include My Name Is Afrika, When the Clouds Clear, and To the Bitter End.

Table of Contents

Foreword	7	(2)
Origins	9	(1)
Song for Melba	10	(1)
Indeed in deed	11	(1)
Of death and lives	12	(1)
Death doses - 3	13	(1)
My people when nothing moves	14	(1)
Of us for us	15	(1)
When brown is black	16	(2)
Brother Malcolm's echo	18	(1)
Mandela's sermon	19	(1)
To Fanon	20	(1)
The air I hear	21	(1)
Shotgun	22	(1)
Mayibuye iAfrika	23	(1)
Random notes to my son	24	(1)
To mother	25	(1)
To my daughter	26	(1)
Time	27	(1)
Innuendo	28	(1)
Like the tide: Cloudward	29	(1)
Towards a walk in the sun	30	(2)
The gods wrote	32	(1)
Re/creation	33	(2)
My name is Afrika	35	(6)
Point of departure: Fire dance fire song
The elegance of memory	36	(2)
Lumumba section	38	(1)
Fire dance	39	(1)
Spirits unchained	40	(1)
For Ipeleng	41	(11)
The present is a dangerous place to live
In the mourning	42	(1)
Beware of dreams	43	(1)
Without shadow	44	(1)
Mirrors, without song	45	(1)
There are no sanctuaries except in purposeful action
Wounded word, insane song	46	(2)
When things fall apart	48	(1)
Exile	49	(1)
Perception	50	(1)
Logistics	51	(1)
Notes from no sanctuary	52	(2)
The same strip of land	54	(1)
Rites of passage	55	(1)
Dance	56	(1)
Morning in Tunis	57	(1)
Luthuli Detachment	58	(2)
When the clouds clear	60	(2)
Red song	62	(3)
For Olinka	65	(2)
Seaparankoe	67	(2)
A luta continua	69	(2)
New age	71	(2)
South Africa salutes Uzbekistan	73	(3)
What time is it?	76	(1)
Dumalisile	77	(2)
I am	79	(3)
Montage: Bouctou lives	82	(2)
Heart to heart	84	(2)
Even skin disappears	86	(1)
Requiem for my mother	87	(2)
For Cecil Abrahams	89	(1)
For Montshiwa and Phetoe	90	(1)
Places and bloodstains	91	(4)
Recollections	95	(1)
Venceremos	96	(2)
Affirmation	98	(1)
Memorial	99	(1)
If I could sing	100	(1)
Renaissance	101	(1)
Rejoice	102
Acknowledgements