Frank Meintjies
BELONGING
In very few words, a strong poem can either evoke a sense of belonging or of displacement, sometimes even simultaneously.
No-one knows this better than Frank Meintjies, poet and social development activist. His debut anthology, A place to night in (Botsotso, 2024) explores what it means to belong or not to belong in all the places he has known. As World Cities Day is celebrated across the world, The AVBOB Poetry Project invited him to share his vision for poetry as a tool to transform marginalised urban lives and spaces.
Several of his poems evoke his longing for deep change and healing, as when, in ‘Ocean, near Strandfontein’, he writes:
Ah, ocean
i want to walk into you…
i want to engage with a full anointing
receive a word or song for the gangland children
from your depths…
In another poem, for and about the city of Cape Town, he urges the reader to dance in the face of “jackhammers in the background / the Jukskei frogs / throbbing engines traffic-light fumes / the cement-mixer with its turning torso / the leaf-blower and the leaves / the mower and the grass cuttings…”
His poems are inhabited by people who want to dream big but often only have access to “toy-small building blocks.” In ‘Permission’, he addresses a succession of disenfranchised township-dwellers, inviting them to expand their horizons in different ways. The tone shifts between exuberance and gritty realism. One stanza invites a rural boy to “go on spend / as if there’s no tomorrow indeed / there isn’t a tomorrow…”
“This tension – between restriction and positive change – runs throughout the collection,” Meintjies confirms. “In ‘Permission’, tomorrow seems closed to the children addressed, yet the poem insists on imagining a better future, a new earth shaped from hardship. For me, poetry holds this balance: it names the limits of our world while opening imaginative space for transformation. Such poems speak to the mental and spiritual constraints of poverty or official impositions. For the poet, writing becomes a way to move beyond these limits.”
Meintjies, who finds inspiration in the robust state of the current South African poetry scene, wants his poems to be experienced as doorways into broader themes. Again and again, he brings us back to the “vast and treacherous waters of the mind”, where we are responsible for reimagining the world around us at every step.
How does he think we could celebrate World Cities Day more creatively?
“There are numerous creative ways to encourage citizens to imagine better cities together. World Cities Day should celebrate dynamism and creative energy. Cities bring forth new ideas and discoveries when we collaborate, but also when we clash and learn from such contestation. The day should call for better planning: safe walking spaces, green lungs, wetlands for birds. Cities must allow contemplation, outdoor activity and community life. Design should acknowledge that we cannot just move from a box-shaped dwelling, via vehicle transport or unsafe walking, to a box-shaped work or shopping place; it should recognise that nature is part of us – and we are part of nature.
“Let’s use art to make the day an immersive, community-driven event. Let’s use interactive canvases, installations, storytelling sessions, participative artmaking to ask questions and generate answers about the future of urban centres and for conversations between cities.”
In the next few days, write a poem describing a place where you have felt displaced but also experienced belonging.
The annual AVBOB Poetry Competition is open for submissions until 30 November 2026. Visit www.avbobpoetry.co.za today and enter your best words.