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The world of rural women, as seen in the poetry of Phelelani Makhanya
Thu, 13 October 2022
The invaluable contribution of millions of women living in remote, rural areas under immensely challenging conditions is seldom seen in the media or acknowledged by city dwellers. This month, on International Day of Rural Women (October 15), the AVBOB Poetry Project honours their experience through the lens of a powerful poet, Phelelani Makhanya.
Makhanya is an entrepreneur from Maphumulo, a village in KwaZulu-Natal. He runs a medical, surgical and general supplies business. Makhanya has won an AVBOB Poetry mini-competition and was a third-place winner in the 2021 AVBOB Poetry Competition. His complex and brave work has been widely published in literary journals, and he writes with a searing visceral intensity about the difficulties and triumphs of rural people, especially women and children.
The title poem of his second poetry collection, My Father’s Blazer, (Minimal Press, 2019) speaks eloquently about growing up in the absence of a father whose blazer he has inherited. “I never knew that a thing made of fabric / can be this heavy / especially a thing of a man gone.” The poem is written from the point of view of a 12-year-old boy, afraid of repeating his father’s mistakes. But what makes the poem work so well is the way its focus widens to include the mother, her hand a “flesh and bone revolver” pointing at her son, her disappointment never explained.
In “Mother’s Hands” he addresses an older woman; her palm prints now inaccessible on account of years of hard labour. In the face of this apparent erasure, he writes, “You know that not all / of your palm prints are lost / some are safely archived in the billion / skin cells of your children / your hands are still soft enough / to apply the balm to soothe / the inflammation on your home yard …”
These poems offer a voice to the voiceless, to “neglected / village wives in black doeks and scarfs.” He places this work at the heart of his poetic enterprise. Makhanya would like to be remembered as a poet who amplified the voices of the voiceless. “Women and children always end up being the worst casualties of social ills. It is even worse in rural spaces where there are no opportunities or development investments. There are no eloquent journalists to report on the daily struggles of these women, of which most are single mothers: widowed or neglected by their men,” says Makhanya.
His earliest poems were written through a personal lens that gradually turned outward, focusing on the real and daily struggles of those around him. “Most of my recent poems are filled with characters. Some are real, some are imaginary. This helps me to avoid being an intruder in my own poems.” This subtle and mature stance makes it possible for a reader to encounter an otherwise unimaginable reality in tender and gut-wrenching lines of verse. An example of this is his poem “Black Jack and Mounds” in the AVBOB Poetry Library.
While most of his work is set in the village where he has lived for decades, Makhanya stresses that these social ills happen everywhere. He uses the village space as a familiar starting point, saying, “I’ve been a part of a village community for my entire life, so I believe I don’t write from a tourist bus window.”
Connecting with readers inspires Makhanya to keep writing. He quotes James Baldwin, who said, “Your pain does not isolate you; it is your bridge.” Several readers wrote to him, telling him how My Father’s Blazer resonated with their own childhood experience. “Through pain we connect because someone out there must have gone through or be going through the same pain,” he concludes.
Enter the AVBOB Poetry Competition with up to ten poems in your mother tongue to help readers connect with and transcend their own difficulties. Entries close on 30 November 2022. Register at www.avbobpoetry.co.za.
Makhanya is an entrepreneur from Maphumulo, a village in KwaZulu-Natal. He runs a medical, surgical and general supplies business. Makhanya has won an AVBOB Poetry mini-competition and was a third-place winner in the 2021 AVBOB Poetry Competition. His complex and brave work has been widely published in literary journals, and he writes with a searing visceral intensity about the difficulties and triumphs of rural people, especially women and children.
The title poem of his second poetry collection, My Father’s Blazer, (Minimal Press, 2019) speaks eloquently about growing up in the absence of a father whose blazer he has inherited. “I never knew that a thing made of fabric / can be this heavy / especially a thing of a man gone.” The poem is written from the point of view of a 12-year-old boy, afraid of repeating his father’s mistakes. But what makes the poem work so well is the way its focus widens to include the mother, her hand a “flesh and bone revolver” pointing at her son, her disappointment never explained.
In “Mother’s Hands” he addresses an older woman; her palm prints now inaccessible on account of years of hard labour. In the face of this apparent erasure, he writes, “You know that not all / of your palm prints are lost / some are safely archived in the billion / skin cells of your children / your hands are still soft enough / to apply the balm to soothe / the inflammation on your home yard …”
These poems offer a voice to the voiceless, to “neglected / village wives in black doeks and scarfs.” He places this work at the heart of his poetic enterprise. Makhanya would like to be remembered as a poet who amplified the voices of the voiceless. “Women and children always end up being the worst casualties of social ills. It is even worse in rural spaces where there are no opportunities or development investments. There are no eloquent journalists to report on the daily struggles of these women, of which most are single mothers: widowed or neglected by their men,” says Makhanya.
His earliest poems were written through a personal lens that gradually turned outward, focusing on the real and daily struggles of those around him. “Most of my recent poems are filled with characters. Some are real, some are imaginary. This helps me to avoid being an intruder in my own poems.” This subtle and mature stance makes it possible for a reader to encounter an otherwise unimaginable reality in tender and gut-wrenching lines of verse. An example of this is his poem “Black Jack and Mounds” in the AVBOB Poetry Library.
While most of his work is set in the village where he has lived for decades, Makhanya stresses that these social ills happen everywhere. He uses the village space as a familiar starting point, saying, “I’ve been a part of a village community for my entire life, so I believe I don’t write from a tourist bus window.”
Connecting with readers inspires Makhanya to keep writing. He quotes James Baldwin, who said, “Your pain does not isolate you; it is your bridge.” Several readers wrote to him, telling him how My Father’s Blazer resonated with their own childhood experience. “Through pain we connect because someone out there must have gone through or be going through the same pain,” he concludes.
Enter the AVBOB Poetry Competition with up to ten poems in your mother tongue to help readers connect with and transcend their own difficulties. Entries close on 30 November 2022. Register at www.avbobpoetry.co.za.
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