SOMETIMES YOU ARE THE VOICE

Contributor: SAMIR RAITI MTAMBA

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Sometimes you are the voice
And I the echo
That you must follow and find.
You do not recede from me
But open up warm and bountiful
For me to settle
And together break into a field of flowers
Colourful as a million butterflies.

Sometimes I am the call
And you the echo
That I must follow and find.
I gather you into my arms
A bouquet of flowers
Sweet-scented, succulent and fresh
Cooling my thirst like water
In the middle of a thicket
As together, we fly into the horizon
Bound for the kingdom of the sun
Where we coalesce and forever are
Call and answer
Answer and voice.

When capricious weather
Separates us
Creating unfathomable distance
Between us
We become voice and echo
Echo and voice
And seek each other again and again
For I am your voice’s distinctive echo
And sometimes I am the voice
That you should echo to the end of time.


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POET, SCRIPTWRITER AND AUTHOR AT ZIMBABWE OPEN UNIVERSITY, NOW INDEPENDENT RESEARCHER, ZIMBABWEAN OF MALAWIAN ANCESTRY EDUCATED IN MALAWI AND PUBLISHED IN USA, CANADA, AUSTRALIA AND MANY ENGLISH SPEAKING COUNTRIES, NOW WORKING ON FILM SCRIPTS AND ENGLISH TEXTBOOKS FOR SCHOOLS.