In The Wilderness

I open my eyes, my face stale from weeping, and look up through the dappled shadows. My fingers maul through the earth beneath me; it is dry and bare.  My ears bleed in the silence. The abandoned atmosphere suffocates me, and I gasp for a breath of life. The endless crowd of towering trees enclose on me as I sit up. Dirt, dust and broken twigs fall from my knotted hair. Thorns, rocks and sticks pierce my bare skin. I realise that I am naked and that I am utterly alone.

It is within this wilderness that I find myself. I have been brought here, but I am forlorn. No matter which direction I walk, or run, or crawl, I still find myself here. In the wilderness.

It is in this place of unmitigated emptiness, uncertainty and disarray that He reveals Himself to me. It is in this vacuum that He sees me in my most raw, unadorned form. He sees me, He knows me, and yet He loves me. It is in His seeing that I am strengthened and made bold. It is in His seeing that the wilderness no longer holds me in fear and weariness. Rather, I am here bound to the process, the refining and the revealing of Him; the mystery.

The ice-wind that once discomforted me, now builds in me character and fortitude. The solitude of the wilderness that once stripped me of myself, now grows in my being a more unfeigned version of me. My nakedness that was once my humiliation, now is my conviction. The abandoned silence that once dejected me, now yields my heart to comprehend even His most inaudible whispers.

I am the soil, the earth, the clay.

He is el roi.



Also see: A Journey

Speaking My Language

I recently read a speech addressed by Ngugi wa Thioung'o at the 2012 Sunday Times Literary Awards. Thioung'o is a Kenyan writer - his work includes novels, short stories, plays and essays, ranging from children's literature to literary and social criticism. In his address, he speaks profoundly on the topic of linguistic power-sharing; culture and the freedom of expression. His words are saturated in revelation and inspiration on two different levels; firstly for the writer, and secondly for the South African. 


For me, as a writer; Thioung'o takes me deeper into the very spirit of 'the writer' with his words:

"But like prophets and seers, writers are driven by a force, an irresistible desire to give to the inner pulses, the material form of sound, colour and word. This desire cannot be held back by laws, tradition, or religious restrictions. The song that must be sing will be sung; and if banned, they will hum it; and if humming is banned, they will dance it; and if dancing is banned, they will sing it silently to themselves or to the ears of those near, waiting for the appropriate moment to explode. Killing the singing goose is the only way of stopping the golden voice of conscience."

For me, as the english-speaking, white South African; I am awakened to the power of language within our context (that being an extremely diverse context which is still experiencing the rippled effects of colonisation, with a total of 11 official languages), and to the more complex reality of the social disposition of each tongue. 

"The second is the democratic access to the means of self-expression... One of the basic, most fundamental means of individual and communal self realization is language. That is why the right to language is a human right, like all the other rights, enshrined in the constitution. It's exercise in different ways communally and individually chosen, is a democratic right."

The words of Thioung'o drive me to the state of hunger. Hunger to appreciate the African language - to acknowledge, perceive and value them. Hunger to learn and humble my own self (my english language and it's social context), so as to lift the African language up. So as to let it rise to it's due place in our beautiful country. I say this in celebration of my language, my culture, the African language, and the African culture - and the beautiful mystery in the yoking of their worlds. It is in this world that I hope to find the writer in me.