#THURSPOETRY: Onai Mushava – Postcard to Santa

#ThursPoetry is back this week again with more words thanks to Gourd of Consciousness Poetry.

Onai Mushava was born in Gutu on 2 June 1990. He studied at Dewure and Gutu missions.

Mushava started writing poetry at 13 and was first published two years later in the now-folded Moto magazine.

His poetry collection, Survivors Cafe, won the NAMA (2018) Outstanding Fiction Prize. Mushava’s poetry is noted for its intertextuality, with influences ranging from Zimbabwean music and critical theory to hip hop and the Hollywood left, as well as his wordplay and pro-poor passion.

As a journalist, he has written for This Is Africa, The Herald, Newsday, The Standard, The Southern Times and few other outlets. He has also worked as a tutorial assistant at NUST.

POEM

Title: Postcard to Santa
Author: Onai Mushava

I need gold teeth to upgrade my plastic smile,
Selfie-stick to be a tourist in my father’s village,
Brown envelope to add the president’s bead to the rosary,
Parliamentary grant to irrigate seaweed,
Diplomatic immunity to ego-trip on peasants’ toes,
Holy water to disinfect the baptismal font,
Ivy League scholarship to profile the coup in uppercase,
Nuclear deterrent for trolls whose planet is the browser,
Beekeeper costume to cross-fertilise Christmas trees,
Council permit to sell oranges for campaign photoshoots,
Davos boutonnière to educate conspiracy theorists,
Traffic lights to keep my thoughts in their tracks,
Santa Claus hoodie to sell motivational books,
Twitter bundle to stud-shame the tsar in Cyberia,
Solar grid to power the sun after the rapture,
Grease to loosen my grip on the suicide pole,
Start-up capital to air-condition hell for politicians,
Invisibility cloak to divert creditors’ blue-face emojis,
Alphabet soup and word salad to spice food porn,
Waterproof Kindle to binge-surf playmates in the shower,
Uncle Sam’s oil-soaked sweatpants to save Wakanda,
Anaconda pills to impregnate the nation with promises,
Mockingjay voice notes to plug the ears of the state,
Urban Dictionary 2.2.1 to keep up with thirsty lumpens,
Election style guide to appease my trophy woman,
Classic Man suit to update my Singles Online profile,
Paparazzi entourage to gatecrash the Sunday service in HD.
Before the prophet breathes tenfold increase on my seed,
Tell him my soul is rotting on the floor of the sewer.
I need a disclaimer to distance myself from this tabloid trash,