High school pupils in South Africa were invited to submit an entry of no longer than 1,000 words on the theme “The Covid-19 pandemic: Viruses, Villains, Victims and Victors”. It could be an opinion piece, a reflective essay, a short story or a poem. The competition is free of charge and submissions could be in any of the 11 official languages.

One of the entries was from Asha Loon, an 18-year-old poet and aspiring filmmaker from South Africa. Loon believes art, in any form, is a way to build a bridge between the internal and external worlds, and is currently in the United Kingdom, where she is studying film and English literature.

Loon said her entry was inspired by the idea of what human existence would be like if the way we structure time was removed altogether. 

“During the lockdown period, it felt like the clocks were broken — we had so much time that we often did not know what to do with it. During this period, many people were able to self-reflect and grow while many others struggled greatly. I wanted to explore the dramatic shift in the way we viewed time and how our previous mindsets were ultimately changed for good. I wanted to express how time is both overwhelming and precious and how its true nature remains regardless of how we perceive it,” she said. 

This is her submission 

***

If all the clocks were broken 

If all of the clocks were broken,

Would we take the time to breathe?

Or would we still revolve around constructs,

Chained to something make-believe?

If all of the clocks were broken,

Would we walk back down the paths we took?

Or would we change our entire direction,

Not giving past choices a second look? 

If all of the clocks were broken,

Would we stop wasting borrowed time?

Would we do everything fear had kept us from,

And explore in between every line?

Or would we simply sit and think

Beneath the timeless sky?

Talking of far-off places and distant dreams

That never said goodbye?

My worn-out stopwatch longed

For all the clocks to finally break.

To witness a silent second,

For the hours it counted to wait.

I wished the spinning clocks

Would let me set aside some time

To recover what was forgotten,

For missing memories to align.

I watched busy people speeding by,

And heard words they didn’t say.

Their chests all yearned for something more

Than just a ringing-alarm-clock day.

If the clocks rested for a moment,

Perhaps I’d have the time to find

A space that felt familiar,

Other than my spinning mind.

The clocks sighed as I tried to escape them,

Their hands spun faster around.

I was screaming for a sense of safety,

And yet barely made a sound.

And then one day;

All the clocks were broken.

Every single one of them stopped.

We were too shaken to hear the silence.

Not a beat, not a tick nor a tock.

So we sat and told the stories,

Shared the secrets, held the hands.

We listened to the motions,

And forgot all of our plans. 

Old scars began to heal,

And new scars began to ache.

Some souls began to mend,

And other hearts began to break.

Our minds began to open,

Time was something of the past.

But we knew that after so many suns,

The silence couldn’t last.

We had to return to the place

Where all there was to do was hope.

The very place where we boldly stood,

Before the clocks all broke. 

I didn’t want fragile time to tick again,

For the clocks to race and spin.

But as I sat watching the orange sky fade,

Winds of change blew over my skin.

The broken clocks meant nothing,

The spinning clocks were nothing but fear.

The sun still set and rose each day,

But my mind began to clear.

It was a wonder how we enhanced

Our grasp of the earth beneath our feet.

The clocks could tick like they always had,

We created courage from defeat.

DM

Social Justice Stories: Viruses, Villains, Victims & Victors is published by The Centre for Sexualities, Aids and Gender at the University of Pretoria.