Me VS The World

Foreword

Dear Heart,

To my sweet heart:

That turns to the same page and plays the same melody again as the sun rises,

Heralding the start of a new day,

The light could be very bright;

But my heart is lost in darkness and no light can find it,

Even when the birds are singing joyfully;

No melody can move, dance, or win my heart,

You can see that I am inconsolable,

Paralysed, and drowning in my anguish,

With my cries constantly ignored,

Getting swept away by the rushing waves of my anguish;

Lastly buried in a mess I produced,

Thus, when the call to curtain rises,

And the sun gets ready to set,

I stay there, still motionless, drowning and immobilized,

I wait for the song to repeat after pausing it,

Because my life is told in that manner.

- Nompumelelo Moyo

* * *

I have selected this poem to be published as an extract from the poetry book written by one of my close friends, an exceptionally talented writer. I completely agree with the body of literature asserting that a foreword penned by the book's other author has more weight.

As mentioned above, the poem was supposed to be a part of an anthology my friend wrote sometime in 2021, with plans for me to be the co-writer. The title of it was agreed to be Letters To Us. Unfortunately, that never proceeded further for several reasons. The book would also be very different from a typical anthology in that it would include short stories in addition to poems, not only poems for flavor.

Like this work, it is divided into two literary genres: fiction and non-fiction. To be clear, I am not changing the rules of literature in any way; rather, I am making space for other writers to write in a way that is natural to them, without feeling constrained.

In addition, I revised the aforementioned original poem (with the author's permission) for this book.

Let's go right into the book without further ado.

I wish you a pleasant time reading the book.