(a thought on Christian unity while in the Transkei)

As one looks at the hills of the Transkei,

One sees beauty, but also the war

Of the wind, rain and sunshine in outcry

'Gainst the soil, black and red - fertile store.

Arid land, fissured cracks, great deep dongas,

Muddy rivers that run to the sea

Tell us all that there's nothing that anchors

Rock to sand, sand to grass, grass to tree.

Are we all not as sand on the hillside -

Countless grains side by side on life's mound?

Shall we too wash away in the storm-tide

Rolling over us, breaking us down?

There'll be scars in this world should it happen,

Wounds that gape ever sore will be left,

Unproductive that soil of erosion;

And in place of such fruit be a cleft.

Jesus Christ - cultivator - must bind us,

Grain to grain He must make us unite.

Precious souls won for him then remind us

That our soil produce bears for the right

Sulenkama

5 January 1964