Helge’s Substack
Helge’s Substack
PART SIX (FINAL) "I'M LOOKING FOR MY COUNTRY"
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PART SIX (FINAL) "I'M LOOKING FOR MY COUNTRY"

A RANT POEM

the CAT grinned at me in that KNOWING way but I knew it knew nothing

it only seemed that way but you were taken in

you haven’t yet learnt how to tell what is REAL and what only PRETENDS to be real

you’ve always been fooled by the SHINY face you’re trying to hard to be ORDINARY

you’re beginning to DIE INSIDE you haven’t had a single thought in your head you

can call your own I enjoy my own company anyway even though this country is

INVISIBLE

THE BOY WHO LOST HIS HEART: FACES NIGHT CLUB 1982/3

PERFORMER/MIME - HELGE JANSSEN

in fact it’s DIVIDED and the heat is on for a NEW NATION

but the platform gets over crowded and the TRAIN just will not arrive at all being

STALLED with white hands and BLACK hearts with BLOOD on their seats and BLOOD

on the walls, BLOOD in the gullies, and BLOOD on the tracks must more BLOOD SPILL?

And then I see this hand which asks for money

but honey, honey, I just don’t have any can’t you see I’m just like you

without these clothes? I’ve had my fare share of CULTURAL TORTURE so why make a

bee line for me or is it just that I have a white skin?

So let’s get back to the end and practise what we preach or else we remain out of reach

so TEACH me TEACH me the value of being me in this land I’m trying so hard to reach.

PHOTOGRAPHER: GERALD BOTHA - STELLA NOVA STUDIOS KLOOF 2015

COSTUME/MAKEUP: HELGE JANSSEN

And then somebody asked if I was BORN here and I said where? where? where?

And he repeated what he didn’t say and then this voice in the WILDERNESS asked if I

was lost and I said well NO not really I’m just sitting on the EDGE of my seat even if I

watch this film it’s still some form of FOREIGN contact the distance seems less far

are you tall enough to reach the bottom?

If the shoe fits throw it away

today today I am going to stop play if things don’t reach some form of APPARITION

and you say you want to be my friend yet when you see the PRICE you ain’t got no

GUTS so just be nice to me huh for once

PHOTOGRAHER: GERALD BOTHA - STELLA NOVA STUDIOS KLOOF 2016

COSTUME/IBEX HORNS: HELGE JANSSEN

I’m at the end of my tether

but that’s what its like when you are MAROONED without a saving grace and the

only thing to do has been to TRANSFORM to take an INTERNAL JOURNEY

I’m at the end of the weather

don’t know whether I am ever going to find

my country

FLOWERS WITH SHADOW 1990

OIL ON BOARD

SIZE: APPROX - 500mm X 700mm

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