my oupa lived in the outside room
of his large house.
he had grown up in sutherland
under the vast karoo skies
before the observatory was built there
herded sheep as a boy
before the wars changed the world –
despite his ancestry and
the complexity of south african colonial politics
he joined churchill’s men
serving in north africa and italy
his mother never forgave him,
that branch of the family tree
remaining severed.
it was a small room
one door one window
deep shadows
a bed a bench
a buckskin on the floor.
sometimes he would sit outside
in his yellow morris chair in the sun
sipping black moerkoffie
from a saucer held in shaking hands.
he smoked a pipe
sniffed snuff from his thumb-joint.
he told us about the war sometimes
my brother and i –
about caves in north africa
that had acted as barracks for both sides.
grim stories of corpses and the bitter biting cold
and trains and towns with strange names
and strange songs.
we hung on those words
traipsing across continents
breathless.
he grew grapes on a trellis on a sunny wall
felt the weather in his bones
predicting rain by the ache in his knees.
he said grace in high dutch
at the dark polished table
big enough for sunday lunch
high ceilinged with fine china
a stern wife and seven children.
sometimes and christmas
my brother and i would sit among them
cousins everywhere
and still the table was big enough
and oupa would pretend to choke on his pudding –
pull a two rand note from his mouth
a ransom to us in those days
and we loathe to eat the brandy soaked confection
vigorously doused it with custard
spooned it in, finding nothing
but small coins amongst the laughter
until his wife would say
that’s enough now albert
and the table would quiet down
and the dishes carried away
alone he would return to his room
off the back of the house
where he slept as always
with his door open to the stars
perhaps as he had
when he was a boy in the karoo
herding sheep on the open plains
in a smaller world
with a bigger sky.
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