Poems from Other Cultures and Traditions

Introduction

In the Anthology, poets from other cultures and traditions are contrasted with those in the English literary heritage. The writers in this section may live in the UK as members of ethnic minority groups or may live overseas. All the poems in this section are written largely or wholly in English, but in several you will find non-standard varieties of English, while several make use of other languages. One even has text in Gujarati.

Sujata Bhatt: from Search for My Tongue

This poem (or rather extract from a long poem) explores a familiar ambiguity in English - "tongue" refers both to the physical organ we use for speech, and the language we speak with it. (Saying "tongue" for "speech" is an example of metonymy). In the poem Sujata Bhatt writes about the "tongue" in both ways at once. To lose your tongue normally means not knowing what to say, but Ms. Bhatt suggests that one can lose one's tongue in another sense. The speaker in this poem is obviously the poet herself, but she speaks for many who fear they may have lost their ability to speak for themselves and their culture.

She explains this with the image of two tongues - a mother tongue (one's first language) and a second tongue (the language of the place where you live). She argues that you cannot use both together. She suggests, further, that if you live in a place where you must "speak a foreign tongue" then the mother tongue will "rot and die in your mouth".

As if to demonstrate how this works, Ms. Bhatt rewrites lines 15 and 16 in Gujarati, followed by more Gujarati lines, which are given in English as the final section of the poem. For readers who do not know the Gujarati script, there is also a phonetic transcript using approximate English spelling to indicate the sounds.

The final section of the poem is the writer's dream - in which her mother tongue grows back and "pushes the other tongue aside". She ends triumphantly asserting that "Everytime I think I've forgotten,/I think I've lost the mother tongue,/it blossoms out of my mouth."

Clearly this poem is about personal and cultural identity. The familiar metaphor of the tongue is used in a novel way to show that losing one's language (and culture) is like losing part of one's body. The poet's dream may be something she has really dreamt "overnight" but is clearly also a "dream" in the sense of something she wants to happen - in dreams, if not in reality, it is possible for the body to regenerate. For this reason the poem's ending is ambiguous - perhaps it is only in her dream that the poet can find her "mother tongue". On the other hand, she may be arguing that even when she thinks she has lost it, it can be found again. At the end of the poem there is a striking extended metaphor in which the regenerating tongue is likened to a plant cut back to a stump, which grows and eventually buds, to become the flower which "blossoms out of" the poet's mouth. It is as if her mother tongue is exotic, spectacular or fragrant, as a flower might be.

The poem's form is well suited to its subject. The flower is a metaphor for the tongue, which itself has earlier been used as a (conventional) metaphor, for speech. The poet demonstrates her problem by showing both "mother tongue" (Gujarati) and "foreign tongue" (English), knowing that for most readers these will be the other way around, while some, like her, will understand both. The poem will speak differently to different generations - for parents, Gujarati may also be the "mother tongue", while their children, born in the UK, may speak English as their first language. The poem is written both for the page, where we see the (possibly exotic) effect of the Gujarati text and for reading aloud, as we have a guide for speaking the Gujarati lines.

“Gujarati” or “Gujerati”? This word is of course not English originally. When it is written down in English letters (“transliterated”) either form may be used. In the official guide Working with the English Anthology 2000/2001, notes on this poem (on page 61) use the spelling “Gujerati” But Professor David Crystal, in the Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language uses the form “Gujarati”. And a search on Google at gives over 100,000 Web pages for “Gujarati”. For “Gujerati”, it shows just over 3,000, and displays a note: “Do you mean Gujarati?” So on the Web, the preferred form, by a majority of some 30 to 1, is “Gujarati”. The form used by the OCR exam board for its GCSE exam is also “Gujarati”. Thanks to Tejesh Kotecha of Claremont High School for raising the question.

Tom Leonard: from Unrelated Incidents

This poem uses non-standard English to explore notions of class, education and nationality. The poem is a phonetic transcript which shows how a Glaswegian Scot might speak. The poet imagines the BBC newsreader smugly explaining why he does not talk "lik/wanna you/scruff" - though in this version, of course, he is doing just this. The writer takes on the persona of a less educated or "ordinary" Glaswegian, with whom he clearly identifies.

The poem is set out in lines of two, three or four syllables, but these are not end-stopped. The effect is almost certainly meant to be of the Autocue used by newsreaders (the text scrolls down the screen a few words at a time).

The poem seems puzzling on the page, but when read out aloud makes better sense. A Scot may find it easier to follow than a reader from London, say.

The most important idea in the poem is that of truth - a word which appears (as "trooth") three times, as well as one "troo". The speaker in the poem (with whom the poet seems to sympathize) suggests that listeners or viewers trust a speaker with an RP (Received Pronunciation) or "BBC" accent. He claims that viewers would be mistrustful of a newsreader with a regional accent, especially one like Glaswegian Scots, which has working-class or even (unfairly) criminal associations in the minds of some people.

The poem is humorous and challenges our prejudices. Leonard may be a little naïve in his argument, however: RP gives credibility to people in authority or to newsreaders, because it shows them not to favour one area or region - it is meant to be neutral. The RP speaker appears educated because he or she is aware of, and has dropped, distinctive local or regional peculiarities. And though RP is not widely-spoken, it is widely understood, much more so than any regional accent in the UK. Tom Leonard's Glasgow accent would confuse many listeners, as would any marked regional voice. RP has the merit of clarity.

John Agard: Half-Caste

This poem develops a simple idea which is found in a familiar, if outdated phrase. Half-caste as a term for mixed race is now rare. Caste comes from India, where people are rigidly divided into groups which are not allowed to mix, and where the lowest caste is considered untouchable. In the poem John Agard pokes fun at the idea. He does this with an ironic suggestion of things only being "half" present, by puns and by looking at the work of artists who mix things. It is not clear whether Agard speaks as himself here, or speaks ...

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John Agard: Half-Caste

The poem opens with a joke - as if "half-caste" means only half made (reading the verb as cast rather than caste), so the speaker stands on one leg as if the other is not there. Agard ridicules the term by showing how the greatest artists mix things - Picasso mixes the colours, and Tchaikovsky use the black and white keys in his piano symphonies, yet to call their art "half-caste" seems silly. (The image of the black and white keys on the piano was used in a similar way by Stevie Wonder in the song Ebony and Ivory: "Ebony and ivory live together in perfect harmony/Side by side on my piano keyboard /Oh, Lord, why can't we?")

Agard playfully points out how England's weather is always a mix of light and shadow - leading to a very weak pun on "half-caste" and "overcast" (clouded over). The joke about one leg is recalled later in the poem, this time by suggesting that the "half-caste" uses only half of ear and eye, and offers half a hand to shake, leading to the absurdities of dreaming half a dream and casting half a shadow. The poem, like a good joke, has a punchline - the poet invites his hearer to "come back tomorrow" and use the whole of eye, ear and mind. Then, says Agard, he will tell "de other half/of my story".

Though the term "half-caste" is rarely heard today, Agard is perhaps right to attack the idea behind it - that mixed race people have something missing. Also, they often suffer hostility from the racial or ethnic communities of both parents. Though the poem is light-hearted in tone, the argument of the last six lines is very serious, and has a universal application: we need to give people our full attention and respect, if we are to deserve to hear their whole "story".

The form of the poem is related to its subject, as Agard uses non-standard English, in the form of Afro-Caribbean patois. This shows how he stands outside mainstream British culture. There is no formal rhyme-scheme or metre, but the poem contains rhymes ("wha yu mean...mix red an green"). A formal device which Agard favours is repetition: "Explain yuself/wha yu mean", for example. The poem is colloquial, written as if spoken to someone with imperatives (commands) like "Explain yuself" and questions like "wha yu mean". The punctuation is non-standard using the hyphen (-) and slash (/) but no comma nor full stop, not even at the end. The spelling uses both standard and non-standard forms - the latter to show pronunciation. The patois is most marked in its grammar, where verbs are missed out ("Ah listening" for "I am listening" or "I half-caste human being" for "I am half-caste").

When you write about the poem you should not use the term "half-caste" except to discuss how Agard presents it. If you need to, use a term like "mixed race". For older readers, especially those aware of the (now scientifically discredited) racial theories of the Nazis, this poem seems powerful and relevant. And in Britain today, resistance to mixed-race couples (who may have mixed-race children) is as likely to come from an Asian or Afro-Caribbean parent as from a white Anglo-Saxon family. (In some ethnic groups, there is enormous family pressure to marry within the community.) Some younger readers, especially those in cosmopolitan communities, may wonder what the fuss is about.

Imtiaz Dharker: Blessing

This poem is about water: in a hot country, where the supply is inadequate, the poet sees water as a gift from a god. When a pipe bursts, the flood which follows is like a miracle, but the "blessing" is ambiguous - it is such accidents which at other times cause the supply to be so little.

The opening lines of the poem compare human skin to a seedpod, drying out till it cracks. Why? Because there is "never enough water". Ms. Dharker asks the reader to imagine it dripping slowly into a cup. When the "municipal pipe" (the main pipe supplying a town) bursts, it is seen as unexpected good luck (a "sudden rush of fortune"), and everyone rushes to help themselves. But the end of the poem reminds us of the sun, which causes skin to crack "like a pod" - today's blessing is tomorrow's drought. The poet celebrates the joyous sense with which the people, especially the children, come to life when there is, for once, more than "enough water".

The poem has a single central metaphor - the giving of water as a "blessing" from a "kindly god". The religious metaphor is repeated, as the bursting of the pipe becomes a "rush of fortune", and the people who come to claim the water are described as a "congregation" (people gathering for worship).

The water is a source of other metaphors - fortune is seen as a "rush" (like water rushing out of the burst pipe), and the sound of the flow is matched by that of the people who seek it - their tongues are a "roar", like the gushing water. Most tellingly of all, water is likened to "silver" which "crashes to the ground". In India (where Ms. Dharker lives), in Pakistan (from where she comes) and in other Asian countries, it is common for wealthy people to throw silver coins to the ground, for the poor to pick up. The water from the burst pipe is like this - a short-lived "blessing for a few". But there is no regular supply of "silver". And finally, the light from the sun is seen as "liquid" - yet the sun aggravates the problems of drought.

The poem is written in unrhymed lines, mostly brief, some of which run on, while others are end-stopped, creating an effect of natural speech. The poet writes lists for the people ("man woman/child") and the vessels they bring ("...with pots/brass, copper, aluminium,/plastic buckets"). The poem appeals to the reader's senses, with references to the dripping noise of water (as if the hearer is waiting for there to be enough to drink) and the flashing sunlight.

We have a clear sense of the writer's world - in her culture water is valued, as life depends upon the supply: in the west, we take it for granted. This is a culture in which belief in "a kindly god" is seen as natural, but the poet does not express this in terms of any established religion (note the lower-case g on "god"). She suggests a vague and general religious belief, or superstition. The poem ends with a picture of children - "naked" and "screaming". The sense of their beauty ("highlights polished to perfection") is balanced by the idea of their fragility, as the "blessing sings/over their small bones".

Moniza Alvi: Presents from my Aunts in Pakistan

This poem can be compared usefully with the extracts from Search for My Tongue and from Unrelated Incidents, as well as with Half-Caste and Ogun - all of which look at ideas of race and identity. Where Sujatta Bhatt, Tom Leonard and John Agard find this in language, Moniza Alvi and Edward Kamau Brathwaite associate it with material things. The poem is written in the first person, and is obviously autobiographical - the speaking voice here is really that of the poet.

Moniza Alvi contrasts the exotic garments and furnishings sent to her by her aunts with what she saw around her in her school, and with the things they asked for in return. Moniza Alvi also shows a paradox (apparent contradiction), as she admired the presents, but felt they were too exquisite for her, and lacked street credibility. Finally, the presents form a link to an alternative way of life (remote in place and time) which Ms. Alvi does not much approve: her aunts "screened from male visitors" and the "beggars" and "sweeper-girls" in 1950s Lahore.

The bright colours of the salwar kameez suggest the familiar notion of exotic clothes worn by Asian women, but the glass bangle which snaps and draws blood is almost a symbol of how her tradition harms the poet - it is not practical for the active life of a young woman in the west. In a striking simile the writer suggests that the clothes showed her own lack of beauty: “I could never be as lovely/as those clothes”. The bright colours suggest the clothes are burning: “I was aflame/I couldn't rise up out of its fire”, a powerful metaphor for the discomfort felt by the poet, who “longed/for denim and corduroy”, plainer but comfortable and inconspicuous. Also she notes that where her Pakistani Aunt Jamila can “rise up out of its fire” - that is, “look lovely” in the bright clothes - she (the poet) felt unable to do so, because she was “half-English”. This may be meant literally (she has an English grandmother) or metaphorically, because she is educated in England. This sense of being between two cultures is shown when the “schoolfriend” asks to see Moniza Alvi's “weekend clothes” and is not impressed. The schoolfriend's reaction also suggests that she has little idea of what Moniza - as a young Pakistani woman - is, and is not, allowed to do at weekends, despite living in Britain.

The idea of living in two cultures is seen in the voyage, from Pakistan to England, which the poet made as a child and which she dimly recalls. This is often a symbol of moving from one kind of life to another (it appears in Charlotte O'Neil's Song).

Edward Kamau Brathwaite: Ogun

In this poem Brathwaite depicts his uncle, a skilled woodworker who could make anything, but who was poor because "the world preferred" mass-produced furniture. Brathwaite shows how on Sunday, when he would not do paid work, his uncle worked out his anger and explored his West African roots, in carving an image of a tribal god. The title of the poem is not explained or repeated elsewhere - so we suppose that this is a clue to the identity of the figure that the uncle carved.

The form of the poem is very clear - it is set out as couplets on the page. If you read it aloud, many of the lines will run on. Sometimes a line ends halfway through a word ("sil-/vered") or a hyphenated compound ("flat-/footed") - but you would not pause long, if at all, in reading this out. Another striking feature is the rich variety of nouns in the poem. Many of these are lists of objects like the uncle's tools or the furniture he makes - some of the terms being quite specialized. A more exotic vocabulary describes the "forests" which the uncle seems to imagine or remember as he works. Brathwaite chooses many words for their sound quality, especially the vigorous verbs ("hit, hurt", "slapped", "tapped", "cut" and so on). Many of these words are onomatopoeic - their sound matches their meaning. Look at "clip-clop sandals", "tapped rat tat tat", "creak" and "stomping". The effect of these is often reinforced by alliteration (repeating the same initial consonant), as in "bird bones...beds, stretched not on boards but blue high-tensioned cables").

Although there is no regular pattern in the poem's metre, Brathwaite often drops into the iambic pentameter (this is the line you know from Shakespeare's blank verse - ten syllables with a stress [usually] on the second of a pair), as in:

"its contoured grain still tuned to roots and water.
And as he cut, he heard the creak of forests..."

This poem has a clear sense of the poet's (and his uncle's) world. He (like Grace Nichols in Hurricane Hits England) has (or his ancestors have) gone from West Africa to the Caribbean. There is an interesting contradiction in the poem: he carves an African tribal god, but is evidently a Christian, as he does not work (for money) in his shop on Sunday, but carves his "block of wood". In his response to his customers' preference for mass-produced goods of poor quality, he not only shows his craft, but he also (like the poet) produces a work of art. His furniture is well made but designed for use - and yet people do not want it. But his Sunday carving has no such utility (unless the image really draws on the power of the god it represents). The western reader, too, can appreciate the contrast between the craftsmanship no-one values and the popular taste, which prefers inferior goods.

Fiona Farrell: from Passengers - Charlotte O'Neil's Song

In this poem, Fiona Farrell writes as if she is Charlotte O'Neil, speaking to her former employer. It is appropriate that her origin is "unknown" because she speaks for all domestic servants. The poem looks at ideas familiar from Victorian novels like Jane Eyre and Great Expectations which explore social class and its relation to personal value. The poem in fact quotes Mrs. C.F. Alexander's hymn All Things Bright and Beautiful, in lines 13 and 14.

The poem has a tight but not completely regular stanza form, loosely a ballad with strong rhymes at the ends of lines. This form is well-suited to the speaker. Note that the poet has put into the mouth of her character only familiar everyday words which the real Charlotte could have said - the poem is authentic, in this sense.

The poem works by obvious contrast, which is set out as antithesis, between the life of the servant and of her employer: "You dined at eight/and slept till late./I emptied your chamber pot." Fiona Farrell also uses the rhetorical (persuasive) device of lists (usually of three): "I've cleaned your plate/and I've cleaned your house/and I've cleaned the clothes you wore". She makes this pattern clearer by repeating the verb "cleaned".

The poem is a criticism of the English class-system in the 19th century. Fiona Farrell finds fault with those who cannot do simple things like opening their own doors. At a more serious level she attacks the injustice of the system, ridiculing the claim that people deserve their status in life. Today this might be fairer (in the west, many people can change their lives by determination and effort) but it was not so in the 19th century. Lines 13 and 14 refer to All Things Bright and Beautiful, a popular children's hymn (written in 1848 but still sung today), where we find this: "The rich man in his castle/The poor man at his gate/God made them high or lowly/And ordered their estate". The writer claims that our position in life is fixed by God and we should accept it - an idea with which few readers today could agree. In Charlotte O'Neil's Song the servant recalls her employers saying this. Note the verb "earns" - we associate this with hard work, deserving reward, but the rich man will in most cases have inherited his castle. (In the 19th century there were, of course, some men who had become rich through their work, but these were still quite rare). The argument that the poor deserve to have little breaks down, when they find a way to earn more - by emigrating to Canada, Australia or New Zealand, where hard work can lead to prosperity, and where society is far more egalitarian.

The poem tells us little about Charlotte and nothing of her new life. But we learn about her attitude and her employers. We find both "Sir" and "ma'am" in the poem, but the line "you're on your own, my dear" refers to just one. The servant's familiarity with things the employer said suggests that it is her mistress to whom she speaks. "You" and "I" in the poem represent the massive gulf in social class between them. The poet, a New Zealander, may also suggest that the current prosperity of the New Commonwealth is a reward for the hard work of the early settlers like Charlotte O'Neil, so the poem attacks England, at least as it used to be.

Arun Kolatkar: An Old Woman

This poem shows the difference between the cultures of east and west, in the meeting of a tourist and the old woman of the poem's title. The poem contains a simple narrative: a beggar woman asks a tourist for money, offering to show him a local shrine in return. The tourist thinks he (or she - it need not be the poet) can resist, but finds he is unable to do so after all.

One of the poem's themes is how the woman is rooted in the place where she lives - she is identified with the sky and hills, and seems to draw power from them. Another idea is that of contrast, or things not being what they seem. At first the tourist sees the beggar as an irritation, yet supposes he can easily be rid of her, facing her "with an air of finality" to "end the farce". But he finds that the woman has a different kind of strength - by the end of the poem he is "small change/in her hand".

The poem has a very clear formal structure in triplets (three-line stanzas). There are occasional half rhymes ("coin"/ "shrine", "on"/ "skin") and a full rhyme to mark a pause: ("crone"/ "alone"). The lines are short, of varying length but always with a pattern of two stressed syllables, apart from the final line, where the single stress brings the poem to a full stop. The poet's vocabulary is spare and vigorous - most words are monosyllables, while some words have two syllables, and only "finality" has more.

The poem refers to the old woman with the third-person pronoun "she" and the tourist in the second-person pronoun, "you". This makes the poem read like an anecdote or an account of a real experience, and puts the reader in the place of the tourist - which seems apt, as we are given the westerner's viewpoint. The immediacy of the poem comes from the forceful monosyllabic verbs, and the use of present tense, as well as colloquial ("grabs", "tags"), or everyday register: "wants", "says", "turn", "hear" and "look". Another device which gives the poem the quality of speech is the placing of "And" at the start of both lines and sentences: "And as you look on..." or "And the hills crack./And the temples crack./And the sky falls..."

The little ("fifty paise") coin, which the old woman begs at the start of the poem, gives the ending its enduring image. The tourist's weakness is suggested in the metaphor of "small change", while "in her hand" indicates that the woman has power over him. Her power is also suggested by details of her physical appearance - her eyes are "bullet holes", as if they are dark spaces with nothing behind. The "cracks" (lines) in her face turn into cracks in the sky, in the hills and in the temples, while the old woman remains invulnerable ("shatter-proof"). "Crone" suggests the magical power of some ancient or supernatural being, who draws her strength from her surroundings.

The meeting of different cultures is very clear in this poem: the tourist comes from the modern world, and at first supposes himself to be able to dispose of this irritating beggar. She seems frail as she "hobbles", and the tourist, while noting that the woman is persistent ("like a burr" - a sticky, hairy seed, which clings to clothes) thinks he knows "how old women are". But he doesn't really know. When she speaks it is as if she casts a spell, and shows him who really controls whom.

Grace Nichols: Hurricane Hits England

The central image in this poem is not the poet's invention but drawn from her (and other people's) experience. The hurricanes that sometimes strike England as destructive storms really do bring the Caribbean to Britain - they retrace the poet's own journey from the west, and remind her of her own origins.

The poem begins in the third person (note the pronouns "her" and "she") but changes in the second stanza to a first-person view as the poet speaks of herself, and addresses the tropical winds. The speaker here could be anyone who has made this journey, but Grace Nichols is probably speaking for herself in the poem. The poem is written mostly as free verse - there is no rhyme-scheme, stanzas vary in length, as do the lines, though the first line of the poem is a perfect pentameter.

The poem is interesting for its range of vocabulary. Ms. Nichols uses the patois form "Huracan" and names the gods ("Oya" and "Shango") of the Yoruba tribe, who were taken as slaves to the Caribbean in times past. She connects this to the modern world, as she names the notorious Hurricane Hattie. There is interesting word play in "reaping havoc" - a pun on the familiar phrase "wreaking (= making) havoc". The poem also brings together the four elements of earth, air (wind), fire (lightning) and water.

But the most striking things in this poem are the images and symbols from the natural world, which explain the poet's relationship to the Caribbean and to England. The wind is called a "howling ship" - "howling" we expect to find with "wind", not "ship". But it is like a ship in having travelled across the ocean. This nautical image is echoed later by the comparison of felled trees to "whales". The reference to an "ancestral spectre" calls to mind the worship of the spirits of ancestors, a practise the slaves took from Africa to the West Indies. Here the ghost of the ancestor is perhaps rebuking the poet for leaving the Caribbean.

In the fourth stanza, Ms. Nichols contrasts the massive power of the natural electricity of lightning with the electricity generated by man. The electrical storm cuts off the mains electricity, plunging us into "further darkness". This may be the literal darkness of England in winter, or a metaphor for the poet's dismay at leaving her homeland.

The fallen trees (which lie around in England after a tropical storm) are seen by the poet as like herself, uprooted from her home. The wind brings warmth to "break (the ice of) the frozen lake" in her - as if the English weather has caused her to lose touch with her emotions. (Associating one's mood with the prevailing weather is a well-established poetic convention, sometimes known as the pathetic fallacy. Here pathetic means to do with feelings [Greek pathos]. It is a fallacy [mistaken belief] because the weather is not literally affected by our moods, or vice versa - it just sometimes seems that way!)

Perhaps the most powerful image, from a Caribbean writer, is that which has its own line, where Grace Nichols asks: "O why is my heart unchained?" In expressing her sense of joy, after the storm has hit England, she recalls the image of freed slaves being released from the chains in which they have been held. Here she shows awareness of her historical culture. Finally, the sense that England and the Caribbean are all part of the same planet is spelled out in the poem's last line. This reads like a tautology (look it up) but expresses Ms. Nichols' sense that the reader needs to know the essential nature of the earth.

Tatamkhulu Afrika: Nothing's Changed

This poem depicts a society where rich and poor are divided. In the apartheid era of racial segregation in South Africa, where the poem is set, laws, enforced by the police, kept apart black and white people. The poet looks at attempts to change this system, and shows how they are ineffective, making no real difference.

"District Six" is the name of a poor area of Cape Town (South Africa's capital city). It was bulldozed as a slum in 1966, but never properly rebuilt. Although there is no sign there, the poet can feel that this is where he is: "...my feet know/and my hands."

Similarly the "up-market" inn ("brash with glass") and the bright sign which shows its name is meant for white customers only. There is no sign to show this (as there would have been under apartheid) but black and coloured people, being poor, will not be allowed past the "guard at the gatepost". The "whites only inn" is elegant, with linen tablecloths and a "single rose" on each table. It is contrasted with the fast-food "working man's cafe" which sells the local snack ("bunny chows"). There is no table cloth, just a plastic top, and there is nowhere to wash one's hands after eating: "wipe your fingers on your jeans". In the third stanza the sense of contrast is most clear: the smart inn "squats" amid "grass and weeds".

Perhaps the most important image in the poem is that of the "glass" which shuts out the speaker in the poem. It is a symbol of the divisions of colour, and class - often the same thing in South Africa. As he backs away from it at the end of the poem, Afrika sees himself as a "boy again", who has left the imprint of his "small, mean mouth" on the glass. He wants "a stone, a bomb" to break the glass - he may wish literally to break the window of this inn, but this is clearly meant in a symbolic sense. He wants to break down the system, which separates white and black, rich and poor, in South Africa.

The title of the poem suggests not just that things have not changed, but a disappointment that an expected change has not happened. The poem uses the technique of contrast to explore the theme of inequality. It has a clear structure of eight-line stanzas. The lines are short, of varying length, but usually with two stressed syllables. The poet assumes that the reader knows South Africa, referring to places, plants and local food. The poem is obviously about the unfairness of a country where "Nothing's changed". But this protest could also apply to other countries where those in power resist progress and deny justice to the common people.