“A voice of the voiceless. A tool to heal, a tool to actual breakdown a lot of stereotypes.”
Those are words of Pumlani Mkiva who uses words and her writing to empower women through hard hitting poetry.
The 27-year-old from Lwandle describes herself as a feminist, pro women empowerment without bashing men.
For Mkiva, poetry came while she attended therapy during her primary years.
Mkiva said she finds healing in writing down her emotions.
She was diagnosed with depression and borderline personal disorder and had to attend therapy for about three years in her adult life.
“This came about not fitting in the beginning at primary school, with a lot of challenges. Then in varsity I got depressed, and I was diagnosed with depression and borderline personal disorder, hence I started therapy,” she said.
“Poetry to me means, a voice of the voiceless. A tool to heal, a tool to actual breakdown a lot of stereotypes that allows one to be someone that you want to be,” said Mkiva.
She believes when she is on stage she is someone she can’t be when she is not on stage.
Mkiva said being a black woman in poetry and that is not doing poetry in her mother tongue is stereotype.
“People will assume that she is a poet and I get on stage to perform in English. The way people perceive me would not be the way I will delivery or be on stage,” she said.
She said she has find it difficult to perform at townships because of such stereotypes which she is eager to breakdown.
Mkiva, a third-year law (Paralegal studies) student at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT), has encouraged parents to support their children not only financially but be available in every step of their lives as they meet different life challenges.
