I Fly Away From Tanzania Poem by Gert Strydom

I fly away from Tanzania
and as the plane turns
over Dar es-Salaam,
I see the statue
of the black man
breaking his chains
and I wonder
who is really free
in a land of poverty?

The sea is dark blue
and a flotilla of small boats
are carrying tobacco, coffee
and cotton to ships
in the deeper water.

The great country
stretches out under the plane
and the massai mara planes
looks as if it goes on
into infinity
and I plan to visit
the Serengeti National Park,
to go to Zanzibar
and to climb mount mount Kilimanjaro
when I return

Three weeks of erecting cell phone towers
flew past in a blink of a eye
and I am going home again
and the Nyasa Lake
passes like a blue sea
under the plane.

Johannesburg international is hot
and it’s the beginning of spring
and the Wimpy has got
cheap burgers
and bottomless Coke
and I drink
as if coming out of the desert
and it’s great to be back
in my own country again.