Landscape, Umfolozi

(For the National Association of Painters in Acrylic)

6 a.m. Mist brushed wet-on-wet
into pale cobalt sky, monestial distance.
A touch more medium. Foreground
oxide of chromium, splattered sap green,
in between a zebra's stripes, carefully redrawn,
off-white against brown-black. At the back
a chatter of baboons burnt umber into the branches;
a lone hyena skulks into sage-green.
In the foreground, quick dabs, the shy eyes
of impala. Catch them quick
before they dry. Through the thorn trees
black bulk of a rhino threatens the stretchers,
the composition. Brushes washed
at the waterhole. The image fades
in the eight o'clock haze

from Selected and Unpublished, Poems 1965-2000. Published by Liverpool University Press 2007.