“…The struggle of black people inevitably appear in an intensely cultural form because the social formation in which their distinct political traditions are now manifest has constructed the arena of politics on ground overshadowed by centuries of metropolitan capitalist development, thereby denying them recognition as legitimate politics. Blacks conduct a class struggle in and through race. The BC of race and class cannot be empirically separated, the class character of black struggles is not a result of the fact that blacks are predominantly proletarian, thought this is true…”- (Frank Talk Staff Writers in ‘Azania Salutes Tosh’ – circa 1981)
front cover:
Tosh by Steve Gordon
back cover:
Kippie by Basil Breakey
The Colours of Our Flag by Allan K. Horwitz (Botsotso, 2016)
The poet prefaces his preface to this collection with a quote by Octavio Paz which describes the nature of a poem as “the irruption of a present which periodically returns without a yesterday or tomorrow. Every poem is a Fiesta, a precipitate of pure time.”
This is an enticing cue as to how to read these poems for each piece claims its own space and the right to be an expression of that moment in which it was written. Kolski Horwitz utilizes this freedom with great energy resulting in many different moods, subject matter and forms.