South of Isandlwana, Rourke’s Drift, Spion Kop

in KwaZulu-Natal, near Bergville

in the Tugela Valley, one March,

we saw the signs of the beginning

of autumn in the southern hemisphere:

tiny, white and infrequent clouds appearing

over the Drakensberg. Beside the pathway

to the sangoma’s kraal – the house

of a local woman, a handsome woman

in her thirties, calm, gentle, commanding,

a healer, a diviner – a small field

of sugarcane rustled, whispered.