POETIC LICENCE RABBIE SERUMULA

THE destination was of no consequence, it was the converging trails of their thoughts that breathed life into that moment; a father was driving with his son.

He told his boy that some of the beggars in the streets aren’t even alive.

He had asked his father why he didn’t give that beggar some money when he asked.

For the boy’s father to detect a void in his aura, he must have had a death in his eyes.

His eyes were filled with emptiness; darkness had taken over the sadness, and the madness had grown into physical pain.

His body is an empty shell, travelling to nowhere, wandering the physical plain.

Some say if you give money to one of these beggars, it is counter to throwing it into a wishing well; you are throwing it into a deep dark hole, where your finances follow, souls need to feed, and the subconscious remembers currency – capitalism in the underworld, or the biological last line of defence in survival, if you may.

Who’s to say hunger pangs cannot turn into meditation; a mediation between body and soul when food for thought doesn’t satisfy the beggar’s appetite, and so his senses start ceasing, he’s constantly attempting to contact the living – nobody knows if he is reaching out or pulling in.

But his mind is a maze, his body is navigating the paths and passages, it’s amazing how his subconscious is the only thread tugging at his heartstrings, keeping him in motion – but his soul is on standby.

He stands and watches life go by, he knows he is too unappealing for physical contact, he has hopes for an emotional connection, but the charity will do – whether alive or dead, bodies need to feed, and the subconscious remembers currency.

The father’s answer to his son’s ears, during that moment in the car, could either breed a disease or enlightenment, superstition or intrigue, fear or shed perspective.

Not all of us will tell a similar tale the same.

An aunty told her niece she should give beggars in the streets food instead.

She told her not to be conflicted, not to sponsor their drug addiction, and that emptiness has a luring effect, it seeps in through sympathy, a subconscious feeling of pity and sorrow for someone else’s misfortune – an art of the shadows.

Shadows operate in the subconscious, where do you think all the dark thoughts you’ve had and never acted on have gone? she asked her niece.

Give them food instead, that way you can feed both their bodies and souls.

Remember that when you have two beasts, the one you feed is the one that grows. Neither the father nor the aunty, nor the son or the niece asked or spoke about where they come from, these shadows. The answer to that question also explains the sympathy we have for them.

We grow to become these shadows, they know us by blood. These shadows are the soul of the city. And it feeds.