MPHUTLANE WA BOFELO
Biko, Jazz and Liberation Psychology
Biko
Biko
Biko
oh Biko!
There are no notes for the jazz of your body,
dancing Black love till the last drop of blood
at the back of the Land Rover. In every drop of blood,
a seed blooms, filling the land with red flowers
of your triumph over fear.
To intone the holy name Bantu—embodiment of being—
Peter Gabriel summons a two-tone beat,
Brazilian drum, vocal percussion, and a weighted guitar.
The Johnny Dyani quartet invites the tongues of Badimo,
free bop, and avant-garde jazz
to call your name.
Mandla Langa evokes the wild storms
and cool breezes of the jazz of the wind
before a new era dawns.
Walking on sacred Bantu Biko Street,
Simphiwe Dana mixes lullabies and savvy jazz,
enchanting melodies resonate—Biko, Biko, Biko.
Your life transcends settler-colonial horrors
and neo-colonial nightmares,
reverberating in Moses’ recall of your dream,
the musopoetic resolve of iPhupho L’ka Biko,
keeping your name alive.
Children worldwide sing your immortality
with graffiti on ghetto walls, rhythm and poetry,
soul, blues, reggae, and organic hymns.
Jazz is your goofy teeth and carefree posture,
defying the smugness of oppression.
Every note of your Black ink on white paper
sings boundless possibilities, challenging
prescribed symbols and dictated terms.
Your redemptive music releases the oppressor and oppressed from the prison of tradition, calling us to an inward journey of self-definition and outward action of self-assertiveness.
For our psychological freedom,
you confront the racism and dehumanization
of Black people, exposing self-estrangement
and the crisis of double consciousness.
You reveal how internalizing worthlessness
breeds a pessimistic view of our place in the world,
cautioning that such hopelessness opens us to nihilism,
which white supremacy thrives on. Biko,
you call for Black creativity and agency—
a reanimating practice combating defeatism.
Jazz, like you, rises against rigidity,
encouraging improvisation and spontaneity.
It speaks the language of a people whose tongues
were cut, finding heart in sound and rhythm.
The oppressors dismissed your lore as backward,
then sought to contain it, much like their reaction to jazz.
Biko, yours is a liberation psychology inviting the dying,
damaged and damned to find life and redemption
in the view of the world and their place and position
in the world free from the negative whispers
of the oppressor in their ears. You tell us,
culture does not fall from the sky,
that psyche does not come out of the blue,
that the self does not emerge from air,
that community is not brewed like instant coffee.
Because of you, we now know
Culture,
Psyche,
Self,
Community,
are interconnected; that God acts in history
through human actions; that God is not a man,
an animal, a plant, a spirit, or the celestial bodies,
but love, justice, compassion, peace,
oneness in unity,
unity in oneness, transcendence!
Liberation psychology embraces awareness
and empowerment, uplifting the marginalized.
It aligns with Black Consciousness, emphasizing
mental liberation and the agency and solidarity
of the oppressed. Jazz, with its versatility
and improvisation, mirrors the unity of spontaneity
and organization, embodying the creative
and resilient spirit of those fighting for freedom.
Biko, jazz, and liberation psychology
form a holy trinity of the dying, damned,
and condemned. In you, the horn, the reed flute,
the defiant pen, raw ink, and holy blood
unite to sing a revolutionary healing song.