Paperback: 78 pages
Language: English
ISBN -13:  978-0-9821660-4-8
Publication Date: June 2009

Every heart has a special rock that anchors it to a particular place that remains constant even as the individual wanders away from it. In The Rock At The Corner of My Heart the heart is never far from the hearth and the original communal circle, to which we always return with Kunene’s persona. Whenever we wander onto painful territory, he humors us into buoyancy through comic ritual cleansing till we experience spring after a punishing winter. The best gift that he finally bestows upon us for our patience is beauty in all its manifestations, particularly as it reveals itself in the healing power of love. Kunene’s humor is balm upon wounds garnered over a lifetime of living honestly and loving fully. 

— Frank M. Chipasula, editor of Bending the Bow: An Anthology of African Love Poetry and former Judge William Holmes Cook Professor, Southern Illinois University Carbondale.

The beautiful title image of this collection is given content in poems ranging from tenderly vivid memories of a communal South African childhood to evocations of a sophisticated American setting of chardonnay and cymbals; moving back to mordantly witty comments on apartheid atrocities and then relocating in playfully symbolic pieces on North American weather states. The rock remains in the heart's corner although the poet wanders far abroad. These poems live in the whole world and see it with a clear eye, whether the particular sight be horrific or joyful. 

— Annie Gagiano, author of Achebe; Head; Marechera: On Power and Change in Africa and Professor of English, Stellenbosch University, South Africa.