Upcoming performances

I have two performances lined up in the next two weeks and would love to see as many of you there as possible:

• Wednesday October 27 - Urban Voices International Poetry Festival, at the Baxter Theatre Centre in Rondebosch. Tickets are R150, book through computicket. Visit http://www.urbanvoices.co.za/ for more information.
• Monday November 1 - Off the Wall Poetry at a Touch of Madness in Nuttal Road, Observatory. The evening starts at 8pm, and there will be an open mic session after the break. Entry is free.

I'm working on a performance to take place in December, but more details to follow about that later. Hope to see you all from behind the mic :)

xx Toni

Whose voice?

Whose voice moves through you? Whose voice sings from your belly, resonates in your throat, and whose voice sings you to sleep at night? Is it your own? Could you recognise your own voice, if it happened upon you as a whisper in your ear? Have you listened? Can you listen? Do you know what it sounds like?

Whose voice lulls you into lies in the daylight bright and glaring, who’s voice calls you away from the truth of dreaming and buries your heart in the fear of believing, the fear of deceiving, the fear of revealing who you really are? Is this your song that plays out in the light of your days or do you save it for the molasses of night, that navy blanket peppered with holes of celestial light that covers you as your tears and sobbing rock you to sleep? Tears the world will never hear as you stifle them, stifle them from the ears that would listen and in their listening coax you out, call your heart to stand in day and lick the light.

Whose song? Tell me who’s song, I want to know, I want to know so I may shatter it against the wall of your insecurity and with one swoop send your blinding wall crumbling to the ground and shatter all that you fake yourself to be, all that you lie to yourself you are, all that you pretend to be so others will not feel small around you. And then as you lie broken and drowning in the ashes of your lies, I will watch, I will witness as that single tear falls, falls, falls, falls, from your heart, and watch it draw a circle in your bed of ashes, to carve light into your molasses night, so your dreams can come pouring in, so you can remember.

And you will sob, you will sob, your body wracked with the pain of exhaling your lies, your masks, your paralysing fear, your indecision, your self-doubt. And then, in your weakest moment, when your body is spent and your bones ache with the brittleness of all that letting go, and you cannot raise your head or a lift a finger, you will breathe again for the first time…

©Toni Stuart – Cape Town, June 17

the lovers - den anker

us writers are people watchers, we see things in the seemingly ordinary moments...

the lovers – den anker

have you seen time stop?

two lovers slowed the clocks in their world

with one touch one look

they sit, heads turned to the still moving water

through the restaurant’s glass

wall, watch the setting sun

turn a sky lonely in shades of pink.

she tucks his mousy brown hair

behind his ears

then one stroke two strokes

with the back of her fingers

against his left cheek.

in that single gesture,

he knows

his head is turned to the mountain; eyes lost as

he smiles

and in that slow instant

as his cheeks

rise to meet his eyes,

she knows too

©Toni Stuart, December 2008

i slept

this is another old poem which i wrote about five years ago and recently found in and among a stack of others. i'm working on a manuscript at the moment and so keep coming across old poems, some of which i will include in the manuscript. this one's a personal favourite

i slept

last night i slept

wrapped in blanket of your voice

lulled to sleep

by smell of your music

harmed

by thoughts of you

i dreamt last night

dreamt

in vivid colours of you

sombre colours of me

and in the breath between the two

we kissed

Toni Stuart, Cape Town, 2004

we build walls

this is an old poem which i wrote years ago but found again recently and thought i'd post it...

we build walls

there are things i will not say like,

‘i still love you’

we build walls

with pens on paper

with tongues in mouths

with hearts

            slow and silent to move behind cages

we build walls

to keep people out

i build a wall

to keep you in.

i wish time would erase you from me

like the Cape Doctor

dispels smog from our skies

but you linger…

the distant memory of you

still warms all of me.

i think i have forgotten

how your tongue makes

sound against teeth to

form words

how your eyes grow when you laugh

i think i have forgotten how fast you eat

how you cut meat and veg into pieces

and heap them onto your fork

how you chew wildly

i think i have forgotten how you sound

i think i have forgotten how warm your hands are

but i have not forgotten

why i love(d) you

and this keeps my heart still

it does not walk

it sits

   lies

   sleeps here

in a bed of you memories

we build walls

when we pull ears from hearts

when we pull eyes from souls

we build walls

to keep people out

to cripple ourselves in

but it is comforting

…it is what we know

Toni Stuart - 2007

© Toni Stuart

A statue of Salvador Dali's 'Clocks' below the London Eye

 

finding his way home

I watch him move and shift in his skin, trying to find the way it fits, but he can not. Not yet. Not now. So he lashes out at the world, because to lash out at himself would mean his implosion. Do not let his anger scare you: he is simply shouting at the demons that sleep in his bed, crawl into his head. Just give him space to spew. Douse his impatience with patience, and help him laugh at his idiosyncrasies’. And his bitterness, just let it fall from his lips, for that is better than letting it stew in his heart, for a heart filled with bitterness will only grow brittle and wither away.
Just watch him as he moves, as he squirms to find his place, watch him as he questions and give him space to breathe. He is exorcising his demons, leave him be, leave him be.
Just love him, from as close as he will allow you to get, love him unconditionally. And show him he is loved, and leave him signs along the path, so he can find his way home...

©Toni Stuart, May 2008, London

she paints...

she paints charcoal wishes with light

as something moves in the wind tonight

and the moon hangs low

as its white-yellow glow

casts a shapeless shadow

over ash-midnight sky

aching hearts wash out to sea in silence

as fear licks her cheek he’s not kissing

too much past in her heart

grow her limbs thin and hard

so her tongue cannot ask

if the dawn means goodbye

when yesterday’s sun shone through old wounds

she knew the time had begun for forgetting

so the fear unravelled

till all she had left

were her unkissed cheeks wet

with winter’s new tears

tears that carve a hole through her smile tonight

as memory mourns the pain she’s not missing

so she paints charcoal wishes with light

as something moves in the wind tonight

and the moon hangs low

as its white-yellow glow

casts a shapeless shadow

over ash-midnight sky

to hold her muffled cries ringing out

in a lonely lullaby

she knows all she can do is let go

© Toni Stuart –2010

Phoenix - commissioned by Agenda Feminist Media

The following is a link to a podcast of Phoenix - a poem I was commissioned to write and record, for Agenda Feminist Media. It was first used for their radio documentary, A Perspective on Girlhood. Visit http://www.developmentagenda.com/2010/05/poem-the-phoenix/ to listen

untitled

beautiful Friday morning,

woke by wind’s

whispers and feint

wisp of sleep’s breath.

In dreams

We know who we are

And in day

We spend our hours

Searching for the souls

Who will remind us of this.

She loses herself in the rain

Eyes closed

Heart open

She waits for wind to wash her clean

South-easter’s spell will

Mould magic in her belly

till she calls forth

her own voice

and speaks with such

clarity

the blade of her tongue

will strike like

a scythe

to reap the truth

from her dying body

it’s time has passed

now only her soul speaks

Listen…

And you will hear it:

A single breath of silence

Between a hundred voices of wind

©Toni Stuart, 2010