What part continues to exist when something disappears?
Introduction by Zaza Muchemwa (Director, Writer, Poet)
Poems selected by Alex Gwaze (Curator) & Joanne Peters (Image Consultant)
Time can be a friend or an enemy, depending on where you are standing. It moves beyond the ending of life, yet it allows us to willingly revisit memories of lost love or loved ones with grace. Our memories can reshape our experience of life, disrupting or colouring the stories we tell ourselves: stories of discipline, sacrifice, companionship, and the years we devoted to a future lived but never reached. What remains are our confrontations with moments, relationships, and versions of ourselves that cannot return. The realisation of what is left forces us to ask deeper questions about what remains within us. What is worth carrying into our nowness?
A Cross Into An Abyss
BY FAIZEL KAZIE ALLIE
South African poet and literary enthusiast inspired by both past and present experiences. He writes poetry across a wide range of themes, using reflection and observation to explore the human condition while embracing poetry as both a creative outlet and a form of therapy. He has entered local poetry competitions, including Poetry.com’s The Cart Horse.
Deaths’ fear has vanished
banished by burden
bidding bye.
A life layered in lesser load
A simmering seamless
endless road
Time is meaningless
in an inner lie?
A second equates to a minute
an hour mutates to a month
a year
a decade.
Confluency has made
an eon from a century
escaping
evolving.
Entering eternity
Death and time tolls into one
Raging river running, run
Dwells deep, unspun
within so silently steep.
Dormant decaying dying
Added anger alive,
prying.
Wells and swells
flows, angels – devils
come to me heaped with them
I shall frolick.
Even after I have weeped.
Burnt
with waning wick.
Fleetingly
a life mimic
onto the world domain
I have tread
Into life’s lane.
Regression
depression
shed in and out
my head.
Aye!
Death is not proud
inward it shall lie
under an inner shroud
at bay.
So silently loud.
Damocles
dancing dangling
in a simmering sea swell
I dwell.
A soulless slivering shell
glimpses gifted
of an earth hell
do I tell?
Concealing
shape shifted
So …
well?
Whispers of The Past
BY MELUSI MUTALE
Zimbabwean poet, writer, and thinker whose work explores resilience, love, memory, hope, and transformation. His debut book, A Journey to Mental Fortitude, established his distinctive literary voice, while his latest collection, The Quiet Universe, reflects his growth as a poet. Inspired by his rural upbringing, Melusi draws deeply on nature and the cosmos in his writing.
Memories of love, of laughter and tears
Tides of memory, that calm my fears
Waves of longing, ebbing slow
A heart that remembers, the love that used to grow.
Like ocean breezes, that whisper low
Echoes of moments, forever to know
The scent of salt, the taste of rain
Transport me back, to love’s sweet refrain.
In twilight’s hush, where shadows play
Memories surface, like waves in gray
I relive moments, of joy and pain
And find solace, in love’s lingering stain.
The tides of memory, they rise and fall
Bringing with them, the love that once stood tall
Though waves recede, the heart remains
A shoreline of memories, where love still sustains.
Like driftwood worn, by time’s gentle hand
My heart bears scars, of love’s withered stand
Yet in the cracks, a light still gleams
A love that lingers, in nostalgic dreams.
In whispers of the past, I hear your name
A gentle summons, that beckons me to claim
The memories we shared, the love we knew
A bittersweet reminder, of what once shone true.
The Alarm Clock
BY MAJEKODUNMI O. EBHOHON
Nigerian theorist-playwright, poet, and journalist who won the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA) Prize for Drama and was runner-up for the Professor Festus Iyayi Poetry Prize. His work has been featured at the Lagos Book and Art Festival, longlisted for the African Human Rights Poetry Competition, and published in Penned in Rage, The Fringe Poetry Magazine, LampLit Magazine, and SaharaReporters. He was a guest poet at HOMEF, TYEN, Poets In Nigeria (PIN), and 60 Seconds Poetry.
My father bought an alarm clock
so he wouldn’t miss a day.
He wound it tight every night
for thirty-four years,
saving up for his retirement.
Yesterday, it woke us up
for his funeral.
MUD Journal 