from CHRISTMAS IN JOHANNESBURG

1.  Homecoming The pavements are escaping suburbia. Uncut, untamed, the kikuyu edges over its concrete confines; shoots high, oblique, in thick tufts, uneven (this African grass, averse to symmetry). Parks become jungles – municipal mowers have holidays too – cats hunt like tigers in thickets of weeds while hadedas, pterodactyls, rise from muddy reeds. Smells are oversweet, overripe. At traffic lights, litter, ash from homeless fires, drawn faces alone in a ghost space.

 

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