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Sunday, February 1st, 2026
Winner: Weekly Poems Contest #27
by Tumelo Corban Tshabangu
Before the hymn, before dark jackets gather, the room knows what to do. Hands move with purpose. Grief has an order. But after after the chairs are folded, after the plates are stacked and returned, after my father, Daniel Tshabangu, is no longer spoken of in crowds the house exhales. Dust settles on empty chairs. Silence sits where he once did. The walls keep his weight. This is what remains: no audience, no ritual, just a son learning how loneliness is inherited.
Biography of the Poet
Tumelo Corban Tshabangu is 26, born and raised in Mamelodi East, and a graduate of Public Relations and Communications
from the University of Johannesburg. His poetry comes from living, feeling, and observing, from the people, places,
and moments that leave traces behind. He immerses himself in both the living and the still,
sometimes stepping into other lives only to watch quietly,
translating what lingers into words that carry memory, grief, and the spaces between.
Keywords: hymn, grief, father, silence, ritual, after the funeral
Previously Published in Weekly Poems:
"Steady State: January" by Theresa Shaw
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