Coming of Age

In ‘The Curse’ we see the existential dilemmas that the characters have to deal with in their day to day life on hard planet earth. These recurring dilemmas become the leitmotiv of the whole collection. The poet uses literary figures and philosophical terms that connect with past literature like Sisyphus, Nirvana, quixotic, The Pied Piper, Spartans, Jim Crow etc. in his poems to show us the situations his characters are going through, likening them to these past literary figures and their stories. In ‘Coming of Age’, the poem that informs this collection and titular to the collection, he talks of the ghetto being, his journey as he tried to break the cycle of poverty and vault himself out of the ghetto and the political situation that weighs heavily on this being. How this being comes of age in the scourge of this time. This is an important and well assembled beautiful collection of poetry of the Zimbabwean struggle.