Remember Your Home Address

"History is the Home Address"
Mongane Wally Serote

we lay there then
and the night
in its buzz
purred time which was passing
it passed slowly
this time
and we were not aware of its passing

as night followed into day and day into night
we lay in dialogue
she asked -
why are they asking if he is fit to rule?
and the cricket
and the purr of the fridge
and the heaviness of the darkness
and the night without breeze or noise
answered in silence

and I asked -
who are they that ask that?
she turned face up
and we shuffled a distance between us

must I believe that
I asked
that there was a pre-colonial time
there was slave trade
there was colonialism
there was apartheid
and because these were there
there is racism
who must I ask in these times of agreement
who must I ask when it seems there are no witnesses
in this time when the burden of the past is also mine?
with no accomplices there have been no perpetrators
who
who must I ask?

...

I panic
in the daylight and the darkness of the night
I pray they may hear
that they may help him
that they may protect him
that they may be kind to him, their son
not to fall into the acid
which acided so many
when he says - there are two nations here
one white and rich
one black and poor
it is the truth
don't they know?
don't they know
that if you go away -
remember your home address
why do they expect him to forget his?
they have not forgotten theirs

...

beloved,
I said
beloved,
she said
what must we learn from our home?

don't forget your address
if you go away
when they ask you
where you come from
search for the address and give them
ah!
when you return
you must know where to go

she said -
history is the home address
it resides in you
it is your sanctuary and you its sanctuary
if you don't know it
or remember it
if you throw it away
its like you enter the desert
where there is just sand and sand and sand,
she said

...

I found this poem a few months ago, scratching in the library for something else. Its long, nearly 70 pages, so I've just typed up extracts from the beginning section here.

It is all set in a conversation between a man and a women, lying in bed, burdened by the state of South African and Africa and trying to make sense of it all, finding their own places in it all. They go on to speak about various other African countries, about images of African people: the soldier, the intellectual, the strong woman, the leaders... they talk through AIDS and poverty, military conflicts, life, culture and important historical events.

I think it is a really beautiful poem, and strong too. Probably what I like most about it is how real it is: a conversation between two people with heavy things on their hearts. The hanging questions, "who killed him" "on whose side are you?", the silences and lapses in conversation where they are involved in their own thoughts, minds wandering to this and that, looking for answers, hopelessness sometimes, hope sometimes.

My favourite poems are poems that make you feel something. And here I felt their confusion and conviction and despair. Which, to me, makes it a beautiful poem. And if they make you feel something, they've opened your eyes and made your world a bit bigger, to see bigger than yourself.

This is a poem about identity, ultimately, and where people find their identities. History is your home address, they conclude. Their answer is that we find our home in our history, this where we come from and how we understand our place in it all. The stories of our people, our exploits and trials, our leaders and our culture. And if we forget where we come from, we lose part of ourselves.

Its coming from a pretty traditional African worldview, so there is lots of emphasis on finding your identity from the group, on the spiritual and on the ancestors. Hence the answer "History is your home address" - you will find yourself in your people and their history, "I am because we are."

Some of these aspects of it are a bit at odds with my own worldview, but I think it holds a lot of truth. And it reminds me of how God exhorted the Israelites to remember their past, and remember what he had done for them:

Remember the days of old; consider the generations long past. Ask your father and he will tell you, your elders, and they will explain to you.
Deuteronomy 32:7