Musaemura Zimunya and Rutendo Chigudu enjoying the launch
Musaemura B. Zimunya
Nació en Zimbabwe, Africa, en 1949. Es poeta, narrador y ensayista. Ha publicado, entre otros, los libros de poemas Y ahora los Poetas Hablan (1982), Huellas de pensamiento (1982), Samora (1987), Chakarira Chindunduma (1985), El destino de los buitres (1989), Porte perfecto (1993), Viraje Nocturno (1994) y Poemas Selectos (1995). Ha publicado diversos artículos sobre la literatura y la música de Zimbabwe, así como ensayos acerca de la realidad social de su país. Ha recibido importantes reconocimientos, desde 1970, entre ellos el National Arts Council Poetry Award (1993), y ha sido invitado por diversas universidades e instituciones del mundo para divulgar la literatura africana.
ESCALADORES
Ansiamos carne y pies hechos de tierra
y piel hecha del más fino barro negro;
alabaremos al alfarero
con brebajes del mejor grano fermentado,
una palabra de la oración más digna
y el restallante sello del pie
el polvo, de hecho, es nuestra eterna mortaja.
Trae la canción,
tú, cuya voz fue la primera
en irrumpir entre los ancestros de las aves,
tú, cuyo cuerno fue una garganta en el reino de las aves,
deja que tu lengua tiemble,
tú, cuyo aullido se apoderó del viento
y lo atrapó entre la boca de la humanidad
tu canción es una diosa en el alba del corazón.
Trae el tambor,
tú, que prolongaste el sonido del buey
más allá del hacha del carnicero
con el toque de la palma encendida
e hiciste que los días secos hicieran eco de nuevo
en la bruma post-invernal del trópico
tu danza es dios esperando en el corazón.
Danos pies que puedan escalar la montaña más vertiginosa
y manos que puedan sujetar los copos tiernos
y cabezas que puedan nivelar las alturas más mareantes
para que podamos traer la roca hasta Zimbabwe.
Pues allí está la cáscara de nuestra alma.
Comodidades de un cálido invierno
el estruendo no impide a la mamba
buscar una madriguera para una fría temporada.
Un verano gordo condujo a la hormiga hacia una industria
más fuerte
más consciente del próximo invierno.
Incluso la multitud aseguró su abundancia
enterrando barras robadas de jabón
aunque su amnesia aseguró su pérdida,
pues no había ningún riesgo a tomar.
Danos el corazón que trascienda la codicia,
danos cabezas que se eleven más allá de nuestras madrigueras
y sean nuestros los ojos que se disparan a las estrellas
en la más oscura y nublada noche.
Una mano a la otra,
una roca a la otra,
una piedra sobre la otra
una pared dentro de otra,
fuera de otra hasta
las torres de la ciudad sobre los árboles
y todos miramos hacia el sueño
más alto que panzas, más alto que collares,
batidoras, uniformes y acentos,
más alto aún que los rascacielos
Para recordarnos, oprimidos e ignorantes,
recordarnos, tú, que tienes la sabiduría,
para subir aún más alto que la mamba
y poner un techo perdurable sobre esta casa.
A FAREWELL TO YOUTH
Yesterday it was you
who warmed the drum with your fingers
when you struck the skin.
We, deranged, sang and danced like frogs
our hands touched the blue sky
while our feet sprang in the air
at the moment of our twilight.
Now who would have thought
that this rebirth would be shrouded
and ready for burial:
who would have thought
we would start to fight
against the ghost
of fear?
And deep in the heart of the land
a little bird sings a doleful song
flicking its tail up and down:
Gone back back back!
We have gone back back back!
A LONG JOURNEY
Through decades that ran like rivers
endless rivers of endless woes
through pick and shovel sjambok and jail
O such a long long journey
When the motor-car came
the sledge and the ox-cart began to die
but for a while the bicycle made in Britain
was the dream of every village boy
With the arrival of the bus
the city was brought into the village
and we began to yearn for the place behind the horizons
Such a long travail it was
a long journey from bush to concrete
And now I am haunted by the cave dwelling
hidden behind eighteen ninety
threatening my new-found luxury
in this the capital city of my mother country
I fight in nightmarish vain
but my road runs and turns into dusty gravel
into over-beaten foot tracks that lead
to a plastic hut and soon to a mud-grass dwelling
threatened by wind and rain and cold
We have fled from witches and wizards
on a long long road to the city
but behind the halo of tower lights
I hear the cry from human blood
and wicked bones rattling around me
We moved into the lights
but from the dark periphery behind
an almighty hand reaches for our shirts.
ARRIVANTS
They came back home from bush haunts
and refugee camps the living and the dead;
and flew back from misery’s northern cold
to colours, bunting, pennants and earth-borne songs
that awoke History and tradition with a bang-bang.
Came to Hope-dawns and democracy with strings attached
and so we were reconciled to white faces
whose pride and heads had watered UDI and racism –
aren’t they keen to teach us compassion!
The year sped on caterpillar wheels as a result
but our ninety-year-old patience seemed to have endless reach
so we could listen to the critics of our monthly
emigrations statistics without wishing for another Ben-Bella.
Then, also, Bulawayo was a place of killing again
to remind us that our peace was a hasty marriage
where we had no training camps for a new order –
to say that the power of peace must be in the new age
reside in hearts of Ndebele and Shona, not in gun-barrels.
Yet when quiet returned in the area of madness
Chaminuka’s words came torrenting and torrenting
and seriously we wondered who would stop this Rain,
or dare we murder another mhondoro?
Or dare we have more petals of blood simply
because someone’s whim pleads for more petals of blood
tomorrow and tomorrow when most want life and rest?
We, indeed, are arrivants with blister feet and broken bones
that will learn the end of one journey
begins another.
FAIRY TALES
In a fairy tale
the gods would snatch you out
through the navel or the thigh of your goddess
or by some Caesarian operation
and so you would come out
complete with armoury:
bows and arrows, quiver and Kerrie
to become a hunter, lover, husband and father.
Even if the goddess died
in the end the miracle would live
in the ears and minds of keen children
huddled around an evening fire
listening to the story of a young god.
But now in this new world
what god would save your mother
and who would pluck you out of a virgin birth
and could you be born with boots and pen
or with an AK or germ factory or A-bomb
and what race of kids would listen tear-ridden
as your miracle was told by what surviving raconteur?
