Song From Otse Hll Poem by Frank Bana

In dreams I watch the desert plain
As the light fades from the scene
My gaze towards the borderline
Where the parched fields turn to green

Held steady by horizon lines
The dry savannah yields to gloom
Summer lightning strikes the earth
And the herdsmen rush for home

Shadowed in the evening light
The kids are safely home from class
Thunder gathers, then descends
To flood the flatlands into glass

Here was lost a clear-eyed youth
I return in older years
In life's defeat to Otse Hill
Weighed down by ordinary fears

Let me see you one more time
In these raindrops thick and warm
Your thirsty flowers are opening
To catch the remnants of the storm

I will keep watch upon this hill
While the women greet and call
To the teasing, dancing clouds
For the summer rain to fall

I sing to praise this sacred hill
Where banished lovers fled to die
And yellow birds that saw them fall
Broadcast their stories where they fly

I sing to tell you how it was
When nations and the world were young
Clear skies of ancient memory
The blue notes of the desert song.