The Second Verse - Onke Mazibuko - Bog

Bokang’s life is falling apart as his family spirals into poverty and conflict over his father's gambling and alcohol addiction.  Bokang Damane is a talented outsider, a dreamer, at his prestigious school.  His problems mount after writing an essay – not even a controversial essay – on racial or political issues. Just a short paper on suicide. Really? Talk about drama.  Now life is just a slog of unsolvable problems. Problem #1: Not black enough for the black kids and too black for the white kids. Yep, that’s what happens when you attend a pompous all boys’ school and live in the suburbs. Problem #2: Family finances are a joke – they can’t even afford Bokang’s initiation as a Xhosa. How can he function without respect, respect that only a Xhosa man commands after the weeks-long initiation ordeal in the countryside? Problem #3: An alcoholic, gambling attorney for a father who expects the world to bend to his will or fist.  Bokang just wants to rap, sketch, and be left alone. Everyone keeps talking about Bokang reaching his true potential, but everyone also keeps getting in the way. So what happens? Boy meets girl – a beautiful girl, Nokwanda.  It wouldn’t be a story otherwise. But she comes with her own set of issues. Most of all, Napoleon, her hulking on again, off again boyfriend who has been known to assuage his jealousies with a good old-fashioned beat-down.It’s a fight to find the flow – a spark to rise above the raging seas of family strife and school pressure and discover a path, though fraught with danger, into the future.