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This month, we celebrate a summer in which the Read Alberta Magazines Tab finally went live on the website. Here’s to a fruitful collaboration with our friends and colleagues in magazine publishing. These poems first appeared in The Polyglot 11.
Valiz Manman’m
by Medgine Mathurin
Inside my mother’s valiz marron is a secret corner pocket
Inside the secret corner pocket is a notepad-shaped rolodex
Inside the notepad-shaped rolodex is a deadline, a lifeline
Inside the deadline is an oath
Inside the oath is a promise to herself
Pou toujou tounnen lakay
éloge pour ma grand-mère Danaïse
by Medgine Mathurin
M’sé
je suis
Pitit fi Merilonne
la petite fille de madame Merilonne Danaïse Rochema Mathurin
née à Plaisance du Sud
ayant des joues aussi hautes que les collines qu’elle prénomme lakay
sans crier gare, elle souriait.
Elle me montrait le trésor qui enrobait l’une de ses dents.
à chaque bout, des cratères gravaient ses joues
c’était une mine d’or qui ne parlait que le créole
à voix autant éraillée que douce tandis que
la mienne, n’était que traînante qui s’efforçait de retrouver la voie vers sa racine
ça fait trop longtemps
j’ai honte de l’admettre –
Elle nous attendait et je le savais
nous attendions un moment plus opportun qu’un tremblement de terre ou autres catastrophes
pour prendre vol
mais la prudence nous a engourdis
Yo di’m se diaspora
but I am her granddaughter
chercheuse de mots haïtiens
Li te toujou mandé pou nou
Li te toujou vle wè nou
Mwen te envi we’l
Mwen te swete konnen kiles ou te ye
ma chère grand-mère
je veux te dire je t’aime
en mots propres et certains
mais je te parle à l’imparfait
malgré le passé composé
j’espère un jour te lui dire en voie ferme et assurée
je t’aimerai toujours au futur simple
KEIKITSE
by Lebo Disele
Keikitse. Mma Sebopiwa. Nkuku.
Dumela! Ke a go dumedisa.
Mme tota ga ke go dumedise ke a lela.
Selelo se segolo ke gore Keikitse!
Diphuka! Mosadi yo montle,
A tshola bana ba bantle!
Kgarebe ya ga Nnete, ya go gola le BaKaa.
Ba re ha o ne o tsene sekole o ka bo o dirile hisetori.
Hisetori ke raya ditsô ka o di itse ka botlalo.
Ntlhabele leinane, Nkuku.
Mpolele bo “gatwe e rile.”
Leinane ke raya o ntlotlela.
Ntlotlele ka ditlholego tsa Botswana—
Tsa baTlokwa, baKwena, baNgwato, baKgatla.
Ga ke itse polelo ya boMatsalaago,
Ya baKaa, ba tshaba ntwa, ba thula tshipi.
Heela Nkuku!
Ka re ntlhabele leinane!
Ka re mpolele bo “gatwe e rile.”
Ka re leinane ke raya o ntlotlela!
Ntlotlele ka boo rra Motshidisi,
baNgwato ba tlholego ya boKwena.
Ba re ‘ne ba sia eng ko Kweneng?
Ke eng ba bangwe ba agile ko Serowe
ba bangwe ba nna ko Palapye?
Nkuku, ntlhabele leinane.
Mpolele bo, “gatwe e rile.”
Leinane ke raya o ntlotlela.
Ntlotlele ka botshelo jwa gago,
Le botshelo jwa ga mmago, le mmaagwe mmago,
le mmaagwe mmaagwe mmaagwe mmago
Ke batla go itse ka bommaarona.
Ka losika la tshadi.
Nkuku, ka re ntlhabele leinane.
Mpolele bo “gatwe e rile.”
Leinane ke raya o ntlotlela.
Ka re ntlotlele ka botshelo jwa gago.
O nkisitse sekoleng o re ke ye go ithuta,
oa lebala gore rona ga re a kwalwa mo dibukeng.
Gore rona re morahe oo lebetsweng.
Ke ile sekoleng ka ithuta seesemane,
boemong jwa gore ke ithute teme ya gago.
Nkuku, ntlhabele leinane.
Mpolele bo “gatwe e rile.”
Leinane ke raya o ntlotlela.
Gore e tle e re kamoso
le nna ka bo ke bolelela bana ba bana
le bana ba bana ba bana ba bana ba gago.
Gore ba tle ba go itse,
Gore ba tle ba nkitse.
Ntlhabele leinane, Nkuku
Le nna ke tle ke ikitse.
KEIKITSE
by Lebo Disele
Keikitse. Mma Sebopiwa. Grandma. Hello!
I am told you could have been a historian,
that hidden behind the veil of your low-hanging headscarf is a long memory of what used to be.
So, Grandma, tell me a story…
Tell me the history of Botswana,
of the Tlokwa, the Ngwato, the Kgatla.
I don’t know the story of the BaKaa,
and how they came to be in this place.
Grandma, tell me a story…
Tell me the story of the Motshidisis,
who came from Kweneng to settle in gaMmangwato,
whose children make home in Serowe and Palapye.
Grandma, tell me a story…
Tell me the story of how you came to be in this place.
Tell me the story of your mother, and her mother,
and her mother’s mother, and her mother’s mother’s mother.
Tell me the story of the women who came before me.
Grandma, I said tell me a story.
Tell me the story of how I came to be in this place.
Tell me our herstory,
the histories that are not written about in books,
or taught in schools.
The forgotten histories.
I went to school and learned to speak
the Queen’s English
but no one taught me to speak in your tongue.
Grandma, tell me a story.
Tell me the story of the women who came before me,
so I can tell your great grandchildren,
and their children, and their children’s children.
So we, too, can know ourselves.
Grandma, tell me a story,
so I, too, can know myself.
—♦—
Medgine Mathurin is a Haitian-born spoken word artist and patient advocate raised in Calgary and currently based in Edmonton. For Medgine, the love of language and the alchemy of words are second nature. Her multilingual upbringing (French, Haitian Creole, English) not only prompted her to begin experimenting with the potential and magic of language, but also naturally compelled her into a deep love of poetry. Her work has been featured on CBC, Global TV, SkirtsAfire Festival, and the Edmonton Poetry Festival. She was selected as a participant in the 2022 Mentorship Program with the Writers’ Guild of Alberta and recently completed her role as mentor with the 2022 Horizons Writers Circle Program, a writing mentorship program for Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour (BIPOC), ESL, and underrepresented writers living in Edmonton. To discover more of Medgine’s work, visit www.medgine.ca and connect with her on Instagram @medginespeaks.
Lebo Disele is a theatre-maker with a focus in movement, acting, directing, and dramaturgy. She was the artistic associate at Mile Zero Dance for Winter 2022 and a part of the Citadel’s RBC Horizon Emerging Artists Program’s 2021 cohort. She recently curated Site/Sight/Place for the Mile Zero Dance mid-winter salon. Select performance credits include The Wolves (The Maggie Tree/Citadel), Breaking Ground (Mile Zero Dance), The Space Between (NextFest, 2021; Expanse Festival, 2022), “Radical Imagination” in Brandon Wint’s Freedom Journal: Antidotes to Violence (2022), All That Binds Us (Azimuth Theatre, 2020), and What (Black) Life Requires (Expanse Festival, 2018). Lebo locates her work within the genre of physical theatre, focusing on interdisciplinary collective creation.