A DARK POET SPEAKS
© Asha Rambally
Farouk Asvat's name is evocative,
recalling as it does, the great tide of black creativity which swept the world
of black art in the seventies. This
period witnessed the birth and burgeoning of the philosophy of black
consciousness with its concomitant themes of black pride, black self-definition
and self-expression, all of which proved to be highly liberating for black
artists. Discarding the traditions of foreign stultifying disciplines, black artists discovered
and developed their own styles and then, drawing their inspiration from the hitherto ignored world of the black experience. They became the chroniclers of their time and
people, not least among them being the poets.
Asvat comes from that generation of
poets. His recently published anthology,
The Time of Our
Lives, reflects many of the preoccupations, events and experiences
underlying black poetry of the seventies.
There is for instance the shock of Sharpeville graphically retold in his
Massacre at
Sharpeville:
Around you stenguns and saracens
shift uneasily
Suddenly your air is
filled with fire
As it burns into your
lungs
And your gut shoots
out
And blood oozes from
your eyes …
I Remember is an epitaph on the tombs of dead
detainees, an ironic reminder that certain attitudes towards deaths in
detention have not changed at all since Ahmed Timol's untimely death in 1971:
your fall from the
sky-
blue building of
police headquarters
And I remember too
the speeding policevan
braking to a halt
and the cop carrying
the cat
off the street
to safety
Asvat's imagery is stark; some of his
poems taut encapsulations of the injustices wreaked on black people. Fietas, in the following lines, records the
heartbreak and pain of forced removals, in this particular instance that of the
black community of the once vibrant suburb of Vrededorp in Johannesburg:
With the variety of my
lives
Drilling holes into my
skull
Smashing windows
Crunching ribs and
sternum
Heaping the
convolutions
To a desolate
landscape.
Quivers to the cry of
the muezzin
The anthology is to a large extent
autobiographical, traversing the period of Asvat's growth and development
between the years 1970 - 1982. So we
learn of his years as a medical student
repeating minuities
upon a rosary
stuck to one endless
groove;
a 'pilgrimage'
to Cape Town, a year's 'banishment' to 'Maritzburg, and the 'silenced years'
spent under a banning order, so succinctly recorded in Forgotten:
Blank paper to talk to
To be filed away
To gather cobwebs
Like a sane person
In an insane
institution
More than anything else, The Time of Our Lives illustrates
the inextricable link between the history of the land and the life of the black
artist. Ever-present in Asvat's work,
even in the more personal poems, is the grim backdrop of South African
politics, which may explain why he is at most times gloomy, a dark poet, so to
speak, almost introverted. The
landscapes he draws are bleak and harsh, as in Winter and Withering Under the Azaleas; but
there are the occasional splashes of bright colour and vivacity, particularly
in the poem penned in Afrikaans. Las' Bus
(the 7 o' clock bus to Lenasia) is a breath of
freshness, spilling with ease the camaraderie and
spontaneity of black people onto the reader.
For the rest, the outlook is grim ... -
our lives and times not having changed much over the last decade. The Gathering of the Fire tells it all:
But now,
Quiet, tired, afraid,
We fumble in the dark
For the gathering of
the fire
Before the dawn comes
Cold, the colour of
blood
[] acknowledgements:
© Asha Rambally : A Dark Poet Speaks
published in: The Graphic,
Durban, p2, 25.02.1983
___________________________________________________________________________
<> blog link: https://faroukasvat-reviews.blogspot.com
<> direct
post link: https://faroukasvat-reviews.com/2019/02/a-dark-poet-speaks.html
<> blog archive: 21
february 2019
___________________________________________________________________________
[§] Books by Farouk
Asvat:
● Sadness In The House Of Love (novel)
● The Gathering Of The Storm (novel)
● I Dream In Long Sentences (poetry)
● The Wind Still Sings Sad
Songs
(poetry)
● A Celebration Of Flames (poetry)
● The Time Of Our Lives (poetry)
● This Masquerade (short stories)
● Bra Frooks … (poetry)*
● The Paanies Are Coming (short stories)*
● In The House Of Love (novel)*
● Weapons Of Words (comparative
literature & literary criticism)
¨ all my books are now available
on amazon: in paperback & kindle
______________________________________________________________
[] please check out my blogs @:
weapons of words: https://faroukasvat-viewpoint.blogspot.com
piquante: https://faroukasvat-piquant.blogspot.com
quran lectures: https://faroukasvat-quran.blogspot.com
streetwise: https://faroukasvat-lingo.blogspot.com
biography: https://faroukasvat-bio.blogspot.com
books by farouk asvat: https://faroukasvat-books.blogspot.com
[] please join me on:
facebook: https://www.facebook.com/faroukasvat
twitter: https://twitter.com/faroukasvat
___________________________________________________________________________
© farouk asvat. All
rights reserved.
Farouk Asvat
asserts his moral right to be
identified as the author of this work.
No part of this publication may be
reproduced by any means whatsoever, or transmitted in any form or any means
whatsoever, mechanical or electronic, including recording, printing,
photocopying, or via any computerised means or media, including the internet. This publication shall also not be stored in
a retrieval system. And the writing
shall not be sold, lent, hired, resold or circulated in any form or binding or
cover other than that in which it is published,
without
the prior permission of the author in writing.
Permission to
publish or reproduce the writings in any format can be obtained from the
author.
Reproduction of
this work without permission, except for scholarly & nonprofit purposes,
is liable to a
payment of 10, 000 ren men bi or US$ 1,500.
farouk asvat can be contacted at: farouk.asvat@gmail.com
[][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][]
the NOVEL Sadness In The House Of
Love by Farouk
Asvat
is now available on amazon: in paperback @ $15 & kindle @ only $5
[][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][]
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