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Phillippa Yaa de Villiers writes, performs and lectures in Creative Writing at Wits University, Johannesburg. She is a member of the African Poetry Book Fund’s editorial board, and is a Distinguished Alumnus of Rhodes University, Makhanda. Her most recent publications are essays in The Creative Arts: On Making and Meaning (Dryad Press, forthcoming); Notes from the Body: Health, Illness, Trauma (UKZN Press, 2023) and Relations: An Anthology of African and Diaspora Voices (HarperVia, 2023) and poems in New Daughters of Africa (Myriad Press 2019), Konch Journal (2020), New Coin Journal winner, Dalro/New Coin best poem winner 2021). She co-edited The Collected Poems of Keorapetse Kgositsile 1969-2018 (University of Nebraska Press, 2023) and is a member of the editorial board of the African Poetry Book Fund. She is a distinguished alumnus of the Rhodes University’s School of Journalism. This contribution to the Evergreen Review is in her personal capacity.

Phillippa Yaa – The river

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Phillippa Yaa – The river

by Phillippa Yaa de Villiers

One day the Hillbrow tower started to cry.

Real tears poured down its sides

collected in the gutters and

ran down  Banket Street.

When the other buildings saw

the tower’s sadness, they started to weep

in sympathy.

Soon the whole city was sobbing,

the tears joined other tears and collected

in the depressions and valleys,

they covered the koppies

cascading over Gold Reef City

flooding Fordsburg and

soaking Soweto.

They flowed until they became a river

that carried us into the night

where our dreams grew

taller than buildings

 

This old poem was found by Abigail Meekel, who drew this beautiful picture to illustrate it!

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