A Thousand Sails

7/27/2019 A Thousand Sails

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A Thousand Sails

By

Dick Romeo Matshaba

Copyright 2013 Dick Romeo Matshaba

All rights reserved.All your written letters my son, some of them are raggedand bent at the corners, some I had to adhere together

with what I could find. I know more than most, that

some words are lost and some memories are forevergone. But your last letter left my hands shaky, my mind

distressed and my eyes teary. You said how you nowforgot my laugh, my face even the way I say your

name all that was left was a far and hazy memory.Forgive me as I still speak to you as if a boy, the years

tell me you are now a man, 30 years; 30 makes a man.

Like this one, dated 31, Dec, 1859. I traced your tears inthis letter, when I held the rough almost brown paper

against the candle light; the ink was tarnished thoughlong past, it still hurts all fabrics of my tampered soul as


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new. Why did I not see this before? Was it that 5th

Christmas the one I said Even if the sea boils to melt

our ship, or the sky angers to strike our sails home iswhere I will be by 24 knowing you, your tenacityyour unbroken tenacity you must have waited through all

the hours of the night.

Did I ever tell you about the day I met your beautifulmother? Yes I did but let me tell you again, that first

story for the end. Your mother, before she became your

mother was lost at sea for days, and the Duke, yourgrandfather, issued a sizable ransom for her body

everyone presumed only a body could be found. I hadnever met her, but Ive heard rumors of her beauty in the

spoken words from the other sailors Fairest of allliving creatures they would say the sailors would say.

I was born at sea, I knew the waters well; the rise of the

tides and the fall of the wind. What life has taught me,my son, has been this Respect Mother Nature and she

will respect you; especially the sea. In my small canoe

only a dingy to your eyes. I sailed into the wretchedheart of the sea. Days went weeks came to follow till

eventually I struck on gold your mother, your fairmother floating on a log.

She was barely alive, simply scrounging for pockets ofair with tired eyes and tired lips, she was still as fair asthe sailors had aired. I left home with one beating heart

in my chest my son, I returned with two. We fell in lovein the vast blue sea. I believe that is were you were

conceived. It was then when I promised her, Id alwaysfind her; a promise I failed to keep. With some of the

ransom I bought a ship, and found a crew. I assure you,


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although I left in 29 my heart never left, it is still not

here but there.

Does she still play her nodes and sing her verse? Doesshe still speak of me? Let me lie to you my son, and tell

you if you write I will write. How I can I tell you this?Old man can make no promises of tomorrow, I have

grown old and ill white hair has replaced the dark,lively soul is now but a tired soul. Born in the sea to live

in the sea to now die in the sea. To make one last

journey; my journey home. 30 years I said too little toyour mother and you about this and that why I left, why

Im here. Let this journal to meet your eyes try toelucidate.

I embarked on a journey to search for truth, 75 spoken

languages buried in my tongue to speak. I visitedvillages who believed I came from the stars, by the color

of my skin. Tribes who killed and ate their young if theywere born at night. My son I have seen the dark side of

the human race. But let this not deceive you or paint

putrid image. I have also met kind souls who would notharm a fly, an ant or a stoat.

But my findings were much deeper than what I had first

anticipated, in all the tribes the clans the villages I had

set both my feet on to walk, one thing was common; theyall had a God. I know youve shaken your head son andwondered 30 years at sea, is this all the old man has now

to show. But if you pause to halt your mind yourknowledge and all you had been taught. And think a

while you will start noticing the queerness that liesburied in this journal.


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They all had a God whether a crocodile at sea, a star inthe sky or even a clay pot. I am sure a part of you wouldagree if I said not all of them could be Gods, especially

the clay pot. Nevertheless, what intrigued and moved memost was an old tribe in the west blessed with long

life. I met a chief there my ears felt deceived when hetold me he was almost 200 years old a later saw the only

thing that deceived me was my knowledge of how thing

s are. He later became a dear friend. In his dying days heimparted on me a secret held by all the chiefs of the

tribe; the story of Qiru.Why is there a sun? a young child one asked the great

chief who all believed had great widom.To shed light of course, the chief said

Then who created the sun? the young one continued toask. The wise chief was clueless, but to quench his

young ones thirst and his dignity as a man of wisdom, hemade up a story.

It was Qiru, young one a huge snake, who spit balls offire, planets and moons, and even made your great, great

grandfather; the first people. Young one believed his

every word, but the chief lived with deceitful lie and hewatched as the story was repeated, generation after

generation a myth turning into a legend, to truth andfinally into religion. This truth had only been breathed

from one chief to his successor.

What can I say to you but that I have now come to

believe the words of the old man, not just for Qiru, butfor all Gods alike? I wish to believe that there is more


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beyond this world than just the ingenuity of our

inventions, the vastness of nothingness. It would give me

great comfort to know that if my breath takes to the skybefore my journey home, at-least there existed thatblissful idea of me, you and your beloved mother in the

ambient heavens.

The violent wind and flashes of light outside are

tormenting my ship, I believe Im writing my words forthe last scribbling these last pages. As the trembling and

wavering ship, is hurling my week soul in varieddirections. A thousand sails I have sailed, a thousand

seas I have known seen. But you my son still remain thegreatest journey I had ever known.

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A Thousand Sails