Everybody is a Bridge

Description

The same poet who observes that “everybody is a bridge/’’ then asks in Zen-fashion, “Is it me, or is it you?/ are you reflection or projection / or the light that’s shining through?’’ can also note in a very down-to-earth way, that “If we hadn’t robbed the car washers of their coin/they might not have turned so mean, you know? / Let them earn a little income, bra/ If we’d chiselled our hearts open, tried to see it from the middle/we’d have softened just a little.” And so, while keeping the big picture of the difficulties before us unflinchingly, Anton imbues such philosophical and political statements with images of very real people and their struggle for survival. But this is one aspect of his writing. As importantly, through these ‘poems, prose- poems, notes & fragments’, runs a whimsical sense of his youth and later years as a white South African whose numerous relatives and friends make their appearance in the form of anecdotal history turned into poetic narrative. In this way, the collection is varied, and very personal and true to Anton’s past and present, a very satisfying buffet that offers a unique taste of his Buddhistic soul.