KNOCK BEFORE YOU ENTER FOR THE LOVE OF POETRY by Mo Adejumo
PROLOGUE
My mother, she is a hopeless romantic I love her very dearly. She believes anyone should be given the benefit of a doubt; she would always try to fix and put together anything broken or brittle. She is my true mama bear, fierce and feisty.
I dedicate this book to my lovely mother Alma and my beautiful sister Betty, she loves tea.
PREFACE
Over the years I knew I wasn’t much of a talker. I was one of those kids you’ll never see having her words all put together and I didn’t catch on fast enough with the other kids at school. I just knew I knew the words to say but very little ability to put them down in writing. But as I grew older and started to construct my words little by little even though they may haven’t been the correct spelling or diction, still I was sure I had to keep on writing for I had so much to say. A wrestling of words in my head I felt I’d lose my mind if I conveyed them and left them bottled up.
And so what you see here in this book is a series of poems and short stories literally diamonds out of the rough. It took me believing and unbelieving and then again believing in myself to write a book or put together a collection of some of my poems. This is me unfolding, becoming and knowing well that somewhere in this big cold world is a girl once like me who is yet to know what it sounds like when she talks and when admits a crowd of people who might not agree with her personality but she would however careless because now she has my poems.
mo adejumo.
CONTENTS
Prologue………………………………………………………………………1
Preface………………………………………………………………………..2
Little girl has a dream 6
In glorious war 8
Ijeoma 11
Black boy 14
Sons of soil 18
Wake up 20
Diamond boy 22
Mirror mir
ror on the wall 25
We die young 28
The old man on papa’s staff (short story) 30
Search your soul 33
College crime 36
Stone casting 39
1960 something 42
For every girl is a broken boy 45
Beauty is black 47
It 50
Ocean blue 53
A sergeant opportune 57
The couch (prose) 61
Beautiful boy 65
Sanctuary 68
She and Eden 70
Noughts and crosses 72
Foreign exports 75
Love came tumbling down 79
Goody goody good for you 81
8(eight) 83
Love that knows no bound 86
The power of scent (a very short story) 88
Perfect imperfection 99
Death the leveller 94
Afro-punk 97
Heaven sent 99
Peace officers living in cosmopolitan era 101
No man’s country 104
Afro beat presentation 106
Wild wild hair 107
No good girl alive 110
The traveller (short story) 113
The soul of the church 125
Little country dreams 127
Put it in my jar 130
Inglorious war (II) 132
Moonlight kisses 134
Sleep 137
Broken people 139
Blind at Bethsaida 141
Pecks of religion 143
Everything Nothing 146
Epilogue…………………………………………………………………..148
Bonus poems
Salvaged thoughts
Water melon
Little girl has a dream
Little girl
Sweet, fine and pure
She has a dream
I wonder what her mother would think about that
A good guessing
She might say:
Whatever she would aspire
She would have to walk ten thousand miles prior to her destination
Whatever feelings she might encounter
Must be selfishly processed and evaluated
You must not trade your dignity for otiose emotions
Whatever is worth dreaming
Must be worth paying with blood
She would find misery
If she must know peace
Inevitable!
I’d swear her mother couldn’t tell it different
It’s a big cold world you’re living in
Little girl
Sweet, fine and pure
She has a dream
Narrative
This illustrates what we all look like as early enthusiastic dream chasers and ambitious cats. We face the world with nothing but the values handed down to us by our parent and then we head on our way with optimistic mindsets hoping we’ll touch our mark without the world hitting us with a blow, but then we all come to face the later truth. Yet lucky for us we realize the essence of those values to put them to use so we could get back up again and move forward.
Used words& terms
-‘walk ten thousand miles prior to her destination’: faith
-‘otiose’: useless purpose
-‘paying with blood’: sacrifices
In glorious war
Ellie! Ellie!
Unleash! Unleash!
For without you
I cannot come out to the open
My pretty pink cheeks
Blushing in tears
My pretty pink cheeks
Black little girl
I wonder in despair
For my love lost in glorious war
He fights for my honor
But how I wish
He was but a common man
Toiling the farm
And bringing me flowers by night
Weary of a firefly
But still my knight in shining armor
Unyielding to my tenderness
For he fears I might put a spell on him
But he’s touched my flower
And given me one for keep
So he’s certain there’s no going back
Ellie ellie
I would never come out to the open
For I am weary of the sun
Less it dries my tears
Taking away my agony
For I must mourn
I must rock time away
While I wait for my love
For you see he fights to earn my pride
He fights for my love
In glorious war
Narrative
A poem about a little girl calling her mother to come out and play with her cause she cannot on her own without being watched as their village faces war stricken times. But her mother is resistant for she mourns the absence of her lover missing in action.
The little girl cries and is filled with sorrow as her mother Ellie insists she would never see the light of the sun, never leave her rocking chair, till her lover comes back to her.
Used words& terms
Lost: missing in action
‘Rock time away’: sit by her rocking chair as time goes by
‘Touched my flower’: taken her virginity
‘One for keep’: given her a child
‘Put a spell on him’: fall deeply in love with her
Unyielding: resistant
Ijeoma
Ijeoma
Like all the geomancy in the universe
She had dreams spread like wild fire
Reaching even to the lines drawn outside her box
A little orange one she cased round to hide the black inside
If only she knew orange was now the new black
Same as yellow and blue
However you’re feeling inside
If only she knew she couldn’t hide
Ijeoma
Like all the hurt she built inside
They’d sing to her
Like a mass composed by a unit of broken hearts
She’ll forget herself in misery to
Camille Saint’s ‘Danse Macabre’
That violin pomp! pomp! Play in her head
Tick! Tickling! The xylophone would wickedly tease her
The army of matching legs
They’re coming for her
She thinks misery yet again
Not even the piano’s soft solo could save her
Ijeoma
Like all the green beneath her foot
Still she can’t see
Still she is familiar with the unknown
She is dancing
Up and down like a ‘Mariachi’
Sweating and panting really fast
Her sack clothing slowly coming off
Her hair slowly turning afro
Still in misery
Yet not in fear, but now understanding
None but herself can free her mind
Ijeoma
Like all the stars that’s in the sky
There’s one for you
There’s one that’s you
Ijeoma
Like all the Ijeomas in the world with her name
None can be like her
None can share her misery
None! But Ijeoma!
Narrative
Ijeoma, like every other girl around her and even far with dreams to fill the earth with wonder, and each phase she steps there is a lesson ahead, she’ll learn to depend on herself.
Used words& terms
-‘geomancy’: divinations connected to the earth
– ‘box’: mind
– ‘green’: possibilities
– ‘sack clothing’: pain
-‘mass’: a choir
Black Boy
Who killed the black boy?
The wood pecker did
Who knows for what cause?
His skin was just too black
Such a thing as too black?
Don’t ask me
Ask the wood pecker
Oh black boy!
If only the sun
Could rest forever on
Your rugged skin
Perhaps you have hope for glory
If only the air was fair
And you weren’t in the jungle out here
Perhaps you innocent cub
Wouldn’t appear so beastly
But you are a Black Boy
Aren’t you?
It’s only safe
Till the sun is down
And the night is stalk black
Still you shine
Shine shine shine
You shine so bright
You terrify the wood pecker
Oh Black Boy!
Perhaps now we know for what cause
Who killed the black boy?
The wood pecker did
Who knows for what cause?
Don’t ask me
Ask the wood pecker
Don’t ask me
Ask Officer Darren Wilson
Narrative
On August 9, 2014, Michael Brown Jr., an 18-year-old African American boy, was fatally shot unarmed by 28-year-old white Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson in the city of Ferguson, Missouri, a suburb of St. Louis. Brown was accompanied by his 22-year-old friend Dorian Johnson who accounted the awful incidence in an interview with the press as reported on Democracy Now! According to Johnson Wilson had pulled them over by the sidewalk for no reason as they made it clear they were only few blocks away from their destination. Johnson stated that Wilson initiated a confrontation by grabbing Brown by the neck through his car window, threatening him and then shooting at him. At this point the two boys fled the scene i.e. Dorian and Brown and according to Dorian, Brown shouted that he keep running as already injured Brown followed behind him. Dorian stated that Wilson then ensued in a short pursuit after which also charging at Brown shooting the teenager multiple times until he fell to the ground. Wilson had fired a total of twelve bullets. It is still recalled today the hand gesture of Michael Brown; the raised hands showing a sign of surrender as the people try to keep his memory alive. The settlement for the lawsuit still remains undisclosed.
Used words& terms
-‘wood pecker’: writer uses it to describe the white police officer, Darren Wilson
– ‘jungle’: the world
Sons of Soil
He sits and crosses his legs
On a firm plank of cultural misdemeanor
While she, dangling back and forth
Carries a keg of cultural dilution
They are in twine.
It’s the seventh time now since she carried the last keg
And yet he, still as steel shares no hustle
He sees himself privileged
Son of the soil
Born and bred in the land of ancient history and beforehand
He finds himself accustomed to its norms and ways
No questions asked, who needed answers
Just another obedient son
But why not
Why scratch silken backs?
Why question the King’s offer for a sit at the table
Befitting to the best
Armor to his hairy, sweat dripping chests
Fortification for his ego
Comfort to his soul
Ebony of sunrise to his native naivety
Native man!
He thinks himself privileged
She pays the price while he takes the price
Son of soil
Sits on a firm plank of cultural misdemeanor
While she, innocent as her Virgin before
Carries a keg of cultural dilution
I see they are in twine
Blind Bats!
Asking no questions, seeking no answers
They find themselves accustomed to their abrupt cluelessness
Sons of soil
Narrative
A woman often plays her role behind the scene and less attention is given her. Her role is far beyond neither obligation nor historical custom, we are in a new age and we need new standards.
Used words& terms
-‘misdemeanor’: a crime less serious than felony
-‘abrupt’: sudden
Wake up
Wake up!
The world is at speed
Wake up
The world can be still
If only you’d see
You ought to
Wake up
And make yourself a dream
So you won’t be left behind the scene
Wake up
And admonish the times of your youth
The times mistakes are due
Wake up
Make yourself a routine
And let determination become
A restless devotion to achieve
A dream
However you may conceive
Wakeup
And marvel in the power
Of your imagination
Free at your disposal
Why then be afraid
Of a free expense
Wake up
And make yourself a dream
Dream Child! Dream
Narrative
Who am I without a dream? Who am I without ambition? Even God’s son knew to use his hands while on earth how much more you whom much has been given?
Used words& terms
-‘due’: expected
– ‘marvel’: awe
Diamond Boy
He’s that type of guy
You know, I mean the one that sits around the corner acting unnoticed
You think he’s not there but trust me he is; every bit of it
Every bit of your existence around him, he knows it
He tries to come out but is held down by the beauty of his finesse
His body, his specialty, his wantedness!
He is beautiful
But he is beautiful and he knows it.
It’s hard for him
He tries to love you but he is just too beautiful
The field is green, bearing beautiful flowers;
He is needy! He finds himself a flower but still stands wanting
Wanting more than just a beautiful flower
“Why have one where there’s plenty more the field I came from”
He loves you, trust me he does;
But he is beautiful, so beautiful he knows it
For at his feet lies green grass,
With plenty of flowers that bears
He tries to pluck one but the grass is much too green,
The flowers are much too beautiful;
He stands hesitant!
He thinks his hesitation is hope for perfection
But the fact is, he is cursed!
Cursed with a beauty so bad
It blinds the eyes of its very possessor
The table is wide, the cards are ready
He finds himself playing the game
Playing it so good, he is smooth as a feather
Slink is his talk, enchanting are his ways;
They call him Diamond Boy!
He is beautiful, so beautiful its only painful he knows it
The grass is green but the waves are raging now!
Though bearing flowers but for how long?
The table is wide, full of anticipating cards;
But for how long would this game play?
You know, He’s that type of guy,
I mean the type that acts
Like he doesn’t love you when actually he does
He is beautiful
So beautiful it’s only sad he knows it
Slick is his talk, enchanting are his ways;
You can’t but not love him
I call him, diamond boy
Narrative
Typical of boys when they are younger and full of life, the world seems to be at the palm of their hands and they’ll play it to the moon and back, yet when it’s finally evening it all appears a lesson.
Used words& terms
– ‘wantedness’: being desired.
– ‘flowers’: signifies females.
– ‘cards’: also girls.
– ‘slick’: smooth talker.
Mirror mirror on the wall
She has a lip stick on
It would wear off in a minute
So she makes it even thicker
They don’t make it easy these days
This beauty thing is a hustle
Bustle, better tighten this girdle
Before she reveals the chunk left after dinner
Someone might tell by the morning
Expression is lately a deserted friendship
She’ll make her loose her glitter
Among her friends
So she lets them know she has no opinion
And mutter unclear words
In a background of loud chattering
I wonder what it sounds like when you speak clearly Mary
Speak up
Record a few words or practice before this same
Mirror you seem to picture your life
And have for yourself at least an imagination
Of how it is you might sound like in a loud space
Good gravy! I bet you don’t even know how you sound
In a quiet place
Oh good wonder!
If all you gave a hoot was the way you feel
And not the reflection of this glass
Not this seemliness purpose you’ve disposed yourself
Would you Mary?
Be a little selfish like ever in your life
Dry your eyes
And quit starring at her
She is nothing but a reflection through a broken mirror
You decide what she would appear
You Mary are the girl before the mirror on the wall
Narrative
This is for the girl who is yet to decide whom to pick among the multiple personalities she embodies. Mostly unconsciously cause she seems to find herself torn in bits, constantly a reflection of what she suppose is required of her by people and society, mostly overburdened, mostly ends up broken.
Used words& terms
– ‘good gravy’: an expression of anger or surprise.
– ‘gave a hoot’: to give all care to something or someone.
– ‘seemliness’: considering for others.
– ‘deserted’: abandoned
We die young
They were watching the fireworks
From the green lawn
Behind them was a battle scene
Guns and fire arms
Illegal kinds
One the government was yet to approve
But maybe only on special aids
The sad song playing
The blood fest
Stolen bride from her dead lover
A child is born
It knows to cry on purpose
The world is full of evil
No mercy is left for the innocent
Only dead men living
We may survive
But death is paramount
Narrative
The fact that we survive is the only reason we stay alive. We may not be unlucky to find ourselves in war stricken environments but the war is all around us, even spiritually.
Used words& terms
– ‘the blood fest’: the shedding of lots of blood
– ‘dead men living’: men who are certain to die
-‘death is paramount’: death is inevitable
A very short story
The Old Man on Papa Staff
Papa called him the witty old fellow
That just wouldn’t die
Even in his death his wish
Was for a wood carved in his image
And placed on the forefront of the
Family house so people could see
He wasn’t going to be forgotten.
Granted, the piece was made
But as the years passed by
The old fellow began to age even in his lifeless state
With bugs and spider webs adorning him like jewelry
And when it came time to renovate the house
Old fellow was tossed into the cellar
Alongside other stuff to be put on sale;
‘The old fellow would shake in his grave’.
And as if the dead could speak, it rained all through the night,
Leaving the whole house flooded with water
It required no medium to explain this mystery
The old fellow was witty enough in this sign.
Years went by and families scattered abroad
Papa found himself on the streets of the city that never sleeps
Only to find old fellow on the forefront
Of an antique shop that sold African art
In astonishment, Papa busted
Old Fellow!
Only God knows the hands this old man had to travel through
Before he returned to his rightful honor
He just wouldn’t be forgotten!
And after constant refusal by the new owner to release the piece
Papa decided to make new carvings of the old fellow
‘This time in different forms and designs’
‘This time with he looking like a king’
The old fellow would smolder with pride in his grave.
Narrative
It’s the things in the past we must hold dear for without it the future we cannot create, be it negative or positive it gives us the experience we need to move forward. We must value the things that tell the story of who we are and who we must become. It will hunt us and never leave us, until we find it to embrace it, we’ll never settle.
Used words& terms
-‘The old fellow began to age even in his lifeless state’: the wood carving began to get rusty and worn out.
-‘the city that never sleeps’: Newyork city.
-‘old fellow on the forefront of an antique shop that sold African art’: Papa found the piece in front of the antique shop.
Search your Soul
Lost and found
Lost and found
Search your soul cause you might be without
The passion of a sharp fruit
Lies beneath the orgasm of its milky drop
Dripping through the lines of its bare skin
I pray for an awakening!
Awakening of souls
Wake your soul
Bleach the mind, glow in pain,
Free from fear!
Free from soliloquizing thoughts!
Break into expression
Expression!
Express your soul my dear
Fear they say demise on the clear sight of
Expression!
Express your thoughts my dear
Staying quite kills thy pride sweet child
Express your heart my dear!
Drink for yourself a wine
Of freshly brewed berry balls, my dear!
Express yourself my dear!
Your glory my dear
Lies beneath the tent of your pride
Express your feelings, my dear!
Sing
‘Who’s looking for a soul?
Lost and found
Lost and found
I find my love
Little love little love
Pain is a game that you play
When you’re hurt
Bleed in this one
Little love
You will heal’
Narrative
In the past I thought conveying my feelings meant I was considerate of others and overall not showing what I was thinking or what was going on inside was the right way to live, I felt I’d be peaceful that way. But with a lot of conveying brought a lot of sobbing instead of tears, lies instead of transparency to cover the truth, and in turn a low self esteem. I know better.
Used words& terms
-‘bleach the mind’: cleanse your mind
-‘glow in pain’: have courage
– ‘brewed berry balls’: signifying confidence
College Crime
Lost Bouvardias
It ends as quickly as it starts.
The great, yet sour damage
Leaves its prints like that on sands of time,
Or maybe so they do, telling vividly through the eyes of regretful witnesses.
Silly amateurs, torn hearts, weary souls.
I think of them as the very enthusiastic ‘Bouvardia,
In her prime, her virgin, zest for life.
Lost and found among thorns, polluted air and peasant savagery
What is it they do this for?
To whose honor lies their cheap solidarity and needless sacrifice?
Lost Bouvardias I thought of them,
Falling in selfish ruthless hands, thwarting destinies,
Leaving generations yet unborn a lineage of pain and wealth in its filthiest kind
Babes the Holy Book would call them
Still to be under their mother’s breasts,
Clueless, yet pure as little infants
We must find the high sounding cymbals!
To call them,
Alarm them if necessary
Remind them, lost Bouvardia, yet to ripen,
Still in her prime, like passion fruit in her passion flower
You’re yet to grow!
You’re branch cut off from its stem
Mama weeps because she dreads the sight of a strange human
Posing before her, calling himself her child
She is weary, in search for her baby
Surely! This was an impostor
Lost Child!
Why is it that you wander in bloody wilderness?
What is it that you seek?
What senseless burden and confusion you lay on yourself
Come home!
For tired eyes awaits you,
Warm embraces is delayed, for your lost touch
Would you come home to love and live?
Or would you die to bloody war, a Lone Ranger!
Narrative
We can account counts of gun shots in my college every year, be it once or twice a year there’s an incidence that triggers such violence, most of which involve the young adult, students against lecturers, students against cadets, students with civilians. We might blame the government but many of these youths have lost their way and are found in crowds they shouldn’t be; seems to me they ought to find their way back home.
Used words& terms
-‘wilderness’: lost in confusion
– ‘Bouvardia’: zest for life
– ‘like passion fruit in her passion flower’: prime
-‘you’re branch cut off from its stem’: out of guidance
-‘lone Ranger’: lacking companionship
Stone Casting
An eye for an eye
A tooth for tooth!
Sadly! Even the ones with smelly decayed tooth
Are present for a portion
A proposition!
Why don’t we leave casting of stones to the oracle?
The ancestors
Surely they were here before us,
Tasted life before our milky mouths could ever know the taste of
Boiled beans, or the sauce to which we romance it
One could even make a symphony of words that rhyme
As to the times gone before
Before War!
We are way too young,
Way too infant to suggest what stones to turn
What verdict given
“Little Lucy was brought before the king;
She had committed a crime
And therefore needed to be punished”
“The infants hailed for terror!
Hailed for judgment”
A convention!
Why don’t we leave casting of stones
To the one who is without self?
The one before us
One to whose hands fined little Lucy and the rest of us
Infants begin to diminish, reminded of the times gone before them
Reminded the epitome of the one who spoke these things
One even thought to say;
Why don’t we war and then in turn submit
War against self
And submission unto love
Surely this would let us to our father’s bosom,
The ancestors,
Oracles looking through the skies
The ones turning the stones and casting the lots
Narrative
The infants found a scapegoat, Poor Lucy, she shouldn’t have been there, not that time; the time to which lied throwing of stones, ill justice and men who found it pleasing to persecute and point fingers. But if she would hold on a little longer the King’s palace was just few steps away maybe there she’ll find vindication, maybe the king would teach them these things and they adhere maybe not.
Used words& terms
-‘ones with smelly decayed tooth’: hypocrites
-‘milky mouths’: infants
– ‘aconvention’: a call to assembly
1960 Something
When was it though
I think it was around
1960 something
The time we swayed off
Our independence in the faces
Of the foreign merchants
In mockery of their illicit purchase
But a sad laugh on our faces
The one we didn’t know was to come
But now is here
Freedom is sweet
But the world is laughing
And their jokes are on us
Freedom is bitter sweet
But I’d rather we taste it
As it truly is
Sore!
Like the backs of our fore fathers
As they worked the freedom fight
Working it out
So we could place our bets
On society’s chess
But to which we lost
For our lack of common reasoning
Sore!
For I see we are yet to be free now
We have declared the war over
Yet now waged against ourselves
Freedom is sweet
But we have since
Wallowed away from its power
Dealt with it so brutally
It has become a useless value
Years have passed
And we still celebrate
It is true freedom is sweet
But the jokes are on us
Narrative
There are diverse ways the jokes tell on us. The way we treat our people, the way we handle our time, the way we love, the way we give, the way we share, the way we rule, the principles we follow, the way we fight and don’t fight, the way we tell our stories that make it unheard and have the world pick it up and tell it falsely, the way we never seem to care regardless.
Used words& terms
-‘swayed off’: showed off
-‘foreign merchants’: colonial masters
-‘illicit’: illegal
-‘common reasoning’: mutual understanding
For every girl is a broken boy
By the water fall
Sally saw d’angelo
There are rainy days
There that lay bound men
For beautiful flowers to set free
But there is death all around him
She’ll loose herself to save his
What purpose has she
If not for love and sacrifice
She summons strength to help unbelief
If I never had to die for love
I’ll die a slave to passion
My mother never knew hope
My father never knew grace for a second chance
I might have lesser fate
Unless I learn to take what love has for me
Narrative
A few miles away from her home was a waterfall, there she made the decision to elope with her sweet heart, an escape from her broken family so she’ll make a new one with him. Yet all she had for hope were his words. She walks on water.
Used words& terms
-‘rainy days’: signifies tragedies
-‘death’: trouble
-‘flowers’: girls
-‘she walks on water’: uncertainty
Beauty is black
I am dark coffee
And somehow when the sun sets
I am like sweet fine caramel pudding
So sweet you could
Taste the milky mint out of my raw essence
I am beauty so bright and bathe
No soap could wash clean
But only tender my already flawless
In built, God given beauty
Shades of my beauty
You say it’s hard for you to define
Or put into colorful sketches
You say,
I wear off with time
And loose my truthful glow and texture
You lose faith in its future
The future of it rising again
Its scattered pieces forming
Wait a minute!
What am I talking about?
Oh! Yes!
My Beauty!
Simply hard to define
Or come to actual count
Of each strand of hair that sprouts
Through the pores of my skin
Nor the mystery behind
Every curl on my head
Or the finesse to which
You see I walk majestically
You find hard to keep up
With each steps that my legs tread
Nor the banter at which
My heart beats every effortless breath
I am beauty definition
Trust! No need to search for a better diction
Mine I have found is best
I am Oh my God! She’s so fine
Look at her gut!
Yes! My gut
My effrontery
To walk into a room
And command control saying;
I have arrived
Make way while I take place
I am beauty simply hard to define or compare
I am black beauuuuuuuty
Sweet sweet caramel pudding
I am black, I am beautiful
My beauty is black
Narrative
A little eulogizing makes for a little confidence and self esteem. Don’t wait for the world to tell you how important you are and more so what significance you can make on it. Say it; I am everything and more…
Used words& terms
-‘caramel’: dark tan color/yellowish brown
-‘bathe’: light
– ‘sprouts’: grows
IT
Curtains turn open
A love tragic scene unfolding
Every face turned deathly pale
Here comes a sweet sad ballad
But a solo cause my love is gone
Tragedies inevitable traits to love
Leaving no remedy for my sore
No healing for the pain
Nothing but a swirling wind of terror above my head
This boy might be my nemesis
In the days to come
Yet in the days to come I might come to understand it
It!
As in the feeling
I know am sure I love him more than I love myself
I shouldn’t, but I could
So I did
Did love him than I loved myself
I still do
But then I did say this boy might come to be my nemesis
Yet there you still find me waiting
In the corner of his constantly drifting shadow
Praying I might come to understand it
It
As in the hate
I think I hate him for making me hate myself for loving him
Calling him undeserving, undemanding of my love
I was willing to give freely, easily!
I shouldn’t, but I could
So I did
Now I pay with blood, sweat and a sheet load of heart pouring
Yet no regret
This boy would be my nemesis in the days to come
But again with him I’d go on a long ride
Across the streets of ghost town
With black and white as our love scene
He traded me lust for love
Pain for passion
But still with him I’ll lay at night
And then rise to a morning of loneliness
With me without him
And me within it
It!
As in my nemesis
This is my nemesis
Narrative
Ever had the feeling something or someone was no good for you yet you find yourself gravitating towards them. The pleasure of the thrill and constant longing for them makes you excited and full of butterflies. You feel the sense of an impending crash still for some reason you think it’s time for you to be a hero, their hero, and then the crash comes; and you’re a hopeless romantic.
Used words& terms
-‘deathly pale’: in fear
-‘ballad’: narrative poem
-‘swirling’: spinning
Ocean Blue
It’s exactly 6:34pm
Exactly the time the sun goes down
And the time for deep blue skies to color
It’s a familiar picture
An assuring blue
A romantic breeze conversant with my body
I can tell
A blessing to those who can’t behold but see
And a curse to ones who behold but cannot see
Search for me in castles built up to the skies
But you won’t find me
Search for me beneath city lights,
Grand sights and distant heights
But you won’t find me
In what’s left of the open
There I’ll lay my head to dream,
Of the sun
Its color left behind for me to shine
Making me dazzle
Like sun cream coco butter
In a universe of wild hearts and out casts
Misfits that can’t fit into tiny stereo boxes
Our light, my light out grows
The four corners of its paved walls
Yellow on the inside
And black on my outside
I’ll color my way up
Color my way out
Till it’s late
So I could lay my head
And dream again
This time of the ocean
In hope my love would make it blue
Narrative
I love the outside. The world and its advancements try to steal the pleasure of nature away from us sometimes and pollute the air. But once in a while is an opportunity to experience her beauty.
Used words& terms
-‘those who can’t behold but see’: the blind who are able to feel and sense the beauty of nature
-‘ones who behold but cannot see’: the ones who have sight but can’t feel nor appreciate nature
– ‘Grand’: impressive in sight mostly worldly
– ‘dazzle’: shine bright
– ‘Yellow’: happy
A Sergeant Opportune
To the officer who needs not the permission
Of the government to exercise his duties
I say you aced it
Good job!
You lose your job as a sales attendant
And macho man by default due to poverty
And failed retention
You decide your best option is to join the force
I mean its only one pen and piece paper away
And conceited zeal will do the rest
Your intentions are not in any way to help the people
Your motive is farfetched from being patriotic
Hoping to hold the justice motto to serve and to protect
You’re are hungry
But of a different appetite
You crave blood pudding
Sliced human thighs
Unarmed teenage child
Cause it reminds of all the things
You never had the courage to be
Gun possession for gun violence
You are hungry and society is your chosen prey
To fill your blood thirst anger
You are the product of thug father and an indifferent mother
And all the things your community is to take blame for
Here is your revenge to buy away your misery
Here is your revenge
You miserable man
You fulfil your desire after your selfish resilience
You earn yourself a vacuous barge
You find yourself your first prey
And celebrate your first kill
You soak yourself in your cigarette
One down, a society more to go
You roam the street begging for arms
Claiming the government isn’t doing their part
Therefore the masses must share in your suffering
You are a thorn in the justice’s ass
But they are helpless cause they are of the same feather
Maybe slightly, but still they won’t get you out this streets
Cause you are a weapon of political please
You are what they call a problem child who must be tolerated
But God knows you are well on your way
God knows you won’t give up
Until you have yourself a blood bath
And men of your kind is still vast
Fostering a legion of illegal arms and terrorizing coups
God knows we are on our way
To being a society with massive outlaws
And overseas patriots
Forced to live and build in another man’s land
Where security is a little more secured
God knows it’s time for the scab to fall open
For our wounds are still fresh
And there is a need for an end
To make way for a new beginning
We the youths are in need of a future
Worth our education and degrees
You force our minds to believe will bring us
Safety and harmless living
In this nation you say is over fifty
Yet we still run down a mile constantly drifting
Because we keep developing yet remain under developing
Teach these broken men
So they will know to do better
And uphold what’s left of our honour
Teach these miserables
Teach
Narrative
I knew a boy once who wanted to be an officer and quite frankly his motive is nothing to be accounted literally. I figure he is not alone in such ideology of what it means to serve, who could blame him there is no proper standard to debate otherwise.
Used words& terms
-‘legion’: association
-‘you are a thorn in the justice’s ass’: a burden
– ‘miserable’: abject cowardice
Prose
The Couch
This couch formed the foundation of our love story. The very first sleepover that transitioned to the very first kiss, the very first love making, the excessive drinking and most of all a gateway to a road of uncertainties. A strange fever overwhelms me I turn blue. I could see every color of my vain, I could see each pores open out of my skin, I could feel the heat of my internal organs bursting out of my body, I could feel my very life walk out on me.
This is true. The very reason I left you. The very reason I left these brazen walls that cautioned through every crack assuring we were broken beyond repair. And now it’s clear there’s no going back, there’s no going home. There’s no going home to the false hopes we thought were fun memories we were building together to someday call fate bringing us close to becoming one and maybe someday live to tell to our supposed children was our love story.
And now we sit back on this couch and realize, were too grown for that. Reality caves in and sweeps us off our childish foolishness making realize how short time was but yet how quickly it ran by leaving us to choose whether or not to walk with it or lag behind. After all it was our decisions to make, our destinies to hold, our futures to create, our eternities to face. For when we come face to face with God there is no immaturity, no apologies for youthful exorbitance, and no excuses for nothing, there’s just us and our souls. Because at that moment there is no body to behold our youthful glow that gloomed our eyes making us blind to the truth that they were all vanity, upon vanity, ashes to ashes, dust unto dust that eventually forms the earth crust to which was the fate no man could escape.
But who were we to be blamed. We were childish as so were our ways; we pretended to know but God knows we were clueless. God knows our relationship goals were built on the ones we saw through the television screens. The romance of TVs’ telenovelas or telemondos and what not, were the founding bricks our love lay bare living us at the receiving end of a catastrophic tale. Once again we find ourselves on this couch with a terrible amnesia on how it was we got here, this far, in this place, this so unfamiliar space with nothing but regret yet a sudden restlessness to forget me as I you, to forgive all our mistakes and run as fast as we possibly could to fall deeply in the hands of our parents in pursuit of remembering how it felt so darling to be a child again, with no responsibilities to cater for or answer to, just nothing but the redemption of poor little infants who forgot their cradle in search for empty clouds.
Alas! Do you remember what I told you about time, how quickly it flew by but how regretfully short it were? Well this is so in our case; we thought our beautifully glowing skin would never turn pale, we thought those three little word ‘I love you’ would never seem overrated. Overrated in the sense that when at some point all I needed was food on the table yet you tell me our love would see us through but news flash it won’t and it didn’t! Because you’re not a man and I’m not a woman, we are young at least our mind is. We were too eager, too hot blooded, too way above the moon we failed to reach the shores of the river before we dived in, we failed to realize one is first a child before one becomes an adult; we went chasing stars and lost count. And so here we go again with this collective amnesia on how it was we got here, this far, this lonely place, this so unfamiliar space, your face so unfamiliar I could barely recognize you, you’re not the man or better yet you’re not the boy I used to know. Suddenly all I see is a face absolutely strange to me and for some reason I find myself praying to God for a new verse to this chapter showing crossed bridges with water underneath them we ought to be careful less we fall. Then you walk out the door and I forget; and watch closely again these walls that bore little cracks that laid cautions we failed to adhere, pray I may not repeat. Still sitting on this old couch as I wait for the sun to come up so I could begin to grow slowly yet surely fresh new memories; eyes closed.
Narrative
Kids want to grow up fast; adults want to be forever young. Kids at their prime ought to know to work with time before they run out of chances for more. Everyone wants a happy ending yet rush towards a sad one; too much careless living spoils the sprouts.
Used words& terms
-‘amnesia’: memory loss
-‘telenovelas or telemondos’: romantic movies
-‘exorbitance’: outrageousness
-‘darling’: dearly loved
Beautiful Boy
I had forgotten
Lady love didn’t tell me
He was in love with me
I do not love myself
Nor see myself the way he sees me
I hope he wouldn’t hate me
When I tell him all I wanted
Was a boy who would smile at me
At a walkway and not come back for me
For long conversation
Am sorry!
I do not know too well
To get to the end of a sentence
I swear am terrified of his presence
I just might pray the earth open
And swallow me from my feet
Up to my chin and fill
I am a poor petrified girl, running from falling
Beautiful boy
His mother raised him proudly
And so I stand
In a crowd of auctioning girls
At his beck and call
With dresses like dolls
Beautiful boy
Would you remember me?
Whilst you’re walking home from school
Or watching a fairy whisk to glory
Reading Shakespeare Romeo and Juliet
Would you remember me?
The girl behind your every shadow
Beautiful boy
I love you
Narrative
This sets the tone of a beautifully gorgeous yet shy girl who would only come unless you call, whose words come in glitches, who would never learn to live magnificently until she runs out of her shell.
Used words& terms
-‘lady love’: imaginary fiction
– ‘petrified’: dazed/stunned
-‘magnificently’: impressively beautiful
Sanctuary
Inter denominations
Tears off the body
My brothers scattered all abroad
Wears off salvation
I can no longer dream of freedom
I used to
But now am caved of your selfish visions
It’s the new craze
Everyone wants to grow a farm
Yet lack the expertise
Now am a confused rebellious
Craving solitude
So I could work out my own salvation
In fear and purpose
Shouldn’t that be the grand; Purpose?
But you all want to make followers of yourself
Yet lie under your nose it is for the course
You know the truth
I pray you are brave enough to agree
So your mouths could be less salty
As you water down your words
Praying for togetherness
Yet print posters with your faces on it
The centre for our attention and more so distraction
We all don’t live the same
But at least we know whom we all appeal
I set my mind free
Narrative
For a long time I wondered why there were so many denominations among the Christians faith, could it be that God didn’t want us to be together, I mean the apostles went near and far moving the course and we all saw the results. So why are things different now, why are there so many men with visions of sharing the gospel. Curiosity or should I say quest led me to do a little research nothing serious and I found, the only reason there are so many denominations is actually nothing special but rather superficial and under the simple fact that people just never get along and what makes or breaks a church; People!
Used words& terms
-‘less salty’: provocative
She and Eden
It was his world before, and then she came
Sharing his power, sharing his existence
It wasn’t supposed to be but she was a need, of necessity
He found loss without her
I believe he was lost of his pride
But then she came and gave him order
Then she came out his might to give him sight
I thought a sight of Eden
What it really looked like, or better!
What magnificence she could make of it
It was his call before but then came her debate, her opinion
To count, to consider, even to agree
Power now was democratic, suggestible and opinionative
I thought she brought segmentation, growth,
Balance!
Fine as ancient wine, essence to compare to none
Fire in her eyes, she could make anything possible
In a single wrinkle of time,
I thought she is possibility
She can, she wills, she does, she conquers,
It’s possible!
She is possibility
Love like hers is Godlike
Unconditional
Righteously
Jealously
Heavenly
She is a god
She is a force
She is Woman
Narrative
In the Garden of Eden there was Adam and eve, in the Garden of Eden there was life and death; she saw opportunity.
Used words& terms
-‘magnificence’: richness
-‘segmentation’: boundary
Noughts & Crosses
Paddle my back
Kiss me but don’t tell
We never seem to win
I think it’s because we keep
Playing noughts and crosses
I keep trying to swing low on this rollercoaster love
But you prefer hippy roads
Undefined destinations
Winter cold nights
You’re weary too much of the future
And all the places you fear
It may not take you through
But darling
Who needs chariots?
When we could ride on trust
On love
My love we would ride longer
If you linger on
And quite playing games
You know I’ll never win
And even then yourself
Let us find a common ground
Make love until sun dawn
Fall asleep in our arms
Then wake me up to feeling sick of your silly jokes
The ones you try so hard to tell
To make up for your sloppy love making
But end up caught in your own
Pool of misery
Lost in your pile of cigarette
You local man
But still I fall in love
Over and over!
Over and over!
Over again
Narrative
We never really win or lose in the game of love, its either you love me or you don’t even want to try. Its either you fake it and lose even though you meant to, or you don’t even want to try. It’s still good; you don’t have to, its love not war.
Used words& terms
-‘rollercoaster’: unsteady
-‘sloppy’: carefree
– ‘misery’: unhappy
Foreign Exports
I suppose when they arrive we’ll know
When they are done misplacing priorities
And leaving us victims
To this abomination
They call civilization
Perhaps then we may converse
I am a local at heart
Blood and sweat too
Where have you put my charm?
Where, to what region
Have you lost our funkiness?
That which used to tell us apart
And tell the others were a nation with a six pack
Iron mask too
And we could not be bamboozled by mere steroids
And artificial bodies claiming to have given us independence
Yet won’t leave us alone
Forgive my crudity
I am no preacher of disunity
Or disengagement of the united world agenda
But how about our local region
Before the world
We are getting too current
Lost in global evolution
What about mama Africa
What about soil and green land
What about trees and wild life
And things like that that make us feel at home again
And not just a modern throwback from slavery
How about the little
Black girl whose waists
Has been demoralized
And sexualized for knowing
To honor the essence of an old African beat
A gan gan solo
Her ever ready ‘mele pa mi lo yo’
You people are the ones that
Have taken her groove
And given her a trunk
Where she could hide and shy away
For she is no longer an innocent
Black little girl
But a public commodity
With elusive advertising
Shipped up with a price for sale
There goes our future
Still enslaved
I hope what’s left of our dignity keeps us from trading
The people
Narrative
This makes me nervous in so many ways because it attracts so many different scenes when I read it over and over again trying to figure out one exact thing to round it all up but I am shattered to pieces. Still, I can try to find a common ground to assembly them all; the way we treat our freedom makes me feel we never understood its value, sometimes it feels as though we lack a mind of our own. And so we trade unconsciously, speak unconsciously, fight unconsciously, elect unconsciously, and even our value for life; unconsciously.
Used words& terms
-‘bamboozled’: fool
-‘steroids’: enhancements
-‘crudity’: wildness
-‘united world agenda’: cooperation
-‘demoralized’: less hopeful
-‘elusive’: difficult to understand
Love came tumbling down
Head over heels
Were we in love
Comforted by the emotions
We shared the most
Fate we said had brought us close
Never a doubt came too close
Our immature minds
Were filled with fantasies
Fantasies that came to torture
Torture that became a battle to fight
Then came it tumbling
The tumbling of all the lies
Then came it tumbling
The tumbling of all our hopes and dreams
Then came it tumbling
The tumbling of all the fantasies
Then came it tumbling
The tumbling of all the lust
Lust!
Lust we professed as love
Lust we built up castles in the air
Then came it tumbling
Love
Love we didn’t even have a clue
Of what it meant or how to love
Then came it all tumbling down on us
Love
Love came tumbling all down
Then came it tumbling
Love came tumbling down
Narrative
The media a lot of times make for countless teenage pregnancies, single parenting, broken homes, drugs and other vices. For how else can a teenager seek to escape the strictness of parental guidance and discipline if not to the world of luxury the media paints and presents to them. It claims to give them possibilities for their dreams yet ends up leaving them lost and suicidal.
Used words& terms
– ‘tumbling’: falling
Goody goody good for you
Goody goody
Good for you
I sure hope you’re satisfied
Oh how I’ve waited to sing this all night
Goody goody
Good for you
So you think that love
Is all about the ride
But I disagree and rhyme
Cause am raining halleluiah
You bet it’s getting to you
Don’t you know it?
Goody goody!
It’s goody good for you
And goody good for me
Good love is all you need
You can take it for a ride
And I hope this satisfies you
Goody goody!
Good for you
Narrative
‘What’s good for the goose is good for the gander’, my old grade school teacher used to say; what was her way of sharing equality among the boys and girls in the class. The boys will fret for their busted egos but the girls were ignorant early bloomers.
Used words& terms
– ‘am raining halleluiah’: symbolizes rain of ideas
– ‘fret’: agitated
-‘early bloomers’: maturing faster
8
So, it happened that I found myself
Compelled by the sayings of Agur
And it inspired my resolution
There are seven things that are too amazing for me
Eight which I do not understand:
Still I cannot find such color
The way of the clouds through the skies
– ‘Ours is a milky galaxy’-
Still I cannot find such grace
The way of light slashing through the dark
– ‘Geophysical’-
Still I cannot compare
The way of a mother to her child
– Unconditional’-
Still I cannot know such peace
The way of a virgin in her pride
– ‘Lily of the valley’ –
Still I cannot find a better institution
The way of a man with a woman
– ‘Eden’ –
Still the world is yet to know a farther woe
The way of man with Lucifer
– ‘Cursed’ –
Still the war is yet to be finished
The way of good and evil
– ‘They are in twine’ –
‘The good detest the bad, the bad detest the good’
Still I may never understand
The way of God with man
– ‘This is the way of love’ –
‘In sin yet still in love, He says; Come’!
Narrative
As I was having a quiet time I came across the chapter enlisting in great details the sayings of Agur, literally. And as I read through it inspired me not only to write on my own humble view of the world but also understanding the position and state of mind Agur had spoken those words to Ithiel . I imagined a state of humility mixed with awesome reference to a flawless being only possible embodiments of a God. Now I don’t know much but I know what great peace it brought to know I may never truly understand certain things that go on in the world but its okay cause there is a God, and I am barely an ounce out of the great magnitude of the universe and what it is still to unfold. I am humble
Used words & terms
‘Milky galaxy’: the earth is often referred as the milky way due to the way the galaxy disk crosses the sky in a company of bright milky light.
‘Geophysical’:
‘Grace’:
‘Lily of the valley’: {s.o.s 2;1} ‘I am a rose of Sharon
A lily of the valleys’
‘Eden’’: a reference to the Garden of Eden where it all began
‘Cursed’: woe to the inhabitants of the earth which the devil
‘In twine’: similar
Love that knows no bound
Bound by blood
Bound to love
Here in this one, I’ve found no escaping
No breakups or let goes
With you is forever, never ending, only evolving
We are more than friends, sisters, or even brothers,
We are companions in the dark,
When the lights come off, with you I still shine bright,
Your love for me is love for self
Lasting bound that never ends
Even till our dying day we still hold strong,
Living and dying together
Love for you is love for self
Lasting bound that never ends
Here in this one, I’ve found a love that has no bound
Narrative
Self love for me is a love that has no bound. It sounds selfish but how I see it is; my ability to love myself first, makes it easier and less troublesome to love another. That is how we first love. We might say the love of a mother is the ultimate and it is, yet that really won’t get us through to loving a person other than the ones we have close ties with, makes you know am talking not only about the love of an opposite sex, but love as ‘Everything’. And how I see it also as a believer is, love for myself is the love for God as he is inside me, even more fantastic.
Used words & terms
-‘dark’: loneliness
-‘With you is forever, never ending, only evolving’: eternity
The Power of Scent
They say there is power in a scent
A concoction of enchanting potion
Strong enough to attract half a nation
A mixture of impelling substance able to penetrate
The mind of the one to which it is served
Well this is true;
Cause a certain smell flew across my nose
And almost instantly it threw back memories
Of a boy, an old white house, and a slight regret
I wanted to meet him
I wanted to tell him the smell of his cologne took me to Paris
And some other days London
I wanted to tell him smelling His cologne alone
Made me fall in love with a total stranger
We didn’t even have to have the same dreams
Yet through a few trips down fairytale
We could make history, together
Two strangers falling in love over the power of a scent
There was very little to put together about him,
All I knew was he was a boy with a hat on and a dashing fragrance
I was young and I knew better it was typical of me
To vulnerably fall for the smell of an unknown face
And on a certain Sunday I went and got myself a cologne too
So that one day he walks by my house
He’d smell me and then realize
We both could make a splatter of everlasting
Lasting! Love scent
I kept waiting in the presence of his constantly drifting shadows
Wishing for a Shakespearean miracle
A scene of our own Romero and Juliet
But then again they say wishes were for beggars
And yet he was a prince and I was a dreamer
I forgot I was chasing thin air
The perfume of the one to whom I could not reach out to
Restlessly dancing with the wind
Then one cold Harmattan night
I knew I heard his voice whispering to a girl
Swearing he’d die for her
And all of sudden my clouds turned grey
With a green light slightly
Pointing down the edge of a star light
And right there I knew, I was free
Like yellow!
Narrative
The longer we hold on to fantasy the longer it rubs us of reality. It’s sweet to dream but it’s also wise to learn to appreciate our own environment and seek to find ways to make it beautiful and even magical if we want, long as we’re present.
Used words & terms
-‘And on a certain Sunday I went and got myself cologne too’: she started to make herself obvious to him
-‘green light’: reality
Perfect imperfection
Where lays it?
Where lays it within the sheets of your heart
Beneath the glares and stares
Of your piercing eyes
Between the bursts and growls
Of your roaring laughter
Along the tears and dents of your ancient scars
Across the edge of your burning desires
Within the echoes of your waging anger
Underneath the mourns and groans
Of your hungry soul
Opposite the dimensions of your empty motions
At the verge of your already drifting body
Where lays it?
Where lays the sanity in all your madness
In all the crows and brawls of your divided emotions
In all the taunts and hunts of your painful regret
In all the scares and depths of your warring memories
In all the corners and bunkers
Of your tired mind
At the crux of your surrendered retreat
I say there lays it
There lies the hope of your pending tomorrow
There lies the passage to your delayed liberty
There lies the lyric to your songs of redemption
There lies the bridge to your narrow escape
There lies a surge
Oh yes! A surge to your redefining
Your redefining divinity
There lies the divine you in all your imperfection
Mining you into your perfection
For in your perfect imperfection lies
Your perfect perfection
So perfect imperfection, just perfect
Narrative
While you would have yourself drenched and weighed off in feeling sorry for all the things you aren’t or the ones you are but isn’t just about worth it or enough to be counted worthy of love, forgiveness or even peace with your own self; think about God the one person so perfect that even his almighty perfection can’t give him the faith of a lost soul.
Used words & terms
-‘growls’: angry utterance
-‘crows’: shrill sound
-‘brawls’: noisy quarrel
-‘surge’: sudden rise
Death the leveler
How do we carry on?
We that thread the earth
At a safer distance
We watch our steps,
Counting each seconds turning to hours
So we might not be left behind
We prepare
Like a bridegroom waiting by the lamp
We are very sure not to covet
Not to converse this same topic
We dread is inevitable
One day my soul
One day my body
One day by night my spirit
As greedy as the grave
Death is never satisfied
Never negotiating enough
To push or pull time
When it comes
It must have its fill
Less it be unsatisfied
Never compromising as to the heart that’s felt
For the absence of a love once was
But now is
Well, eternal
So how must we carry on?
We that scatter the earth
In loss of our loved ones
The ones dearly beloved to us
We hope it’s only a dream
For reality seem all so vague
And void of colour
We lose our sensitivity to the things
That once brought us joy
And priceless peace
We watch ourselves
Grow used to the taste of our salty tears
Listening closely to the sound
Of our hearts breathing
We hope it will stop
And end our misery
Like death
We want it to know
We are unafraid
Unafraid of it being inevitable
We too will be unsatisfied
When it comes
We will be ready!
Narrative
Whether or not we choose to discuss it, it is an indispensible fact attached to the human existence. I don’t know about you but the thought of eternity makes death even less direful.
Used words & terms
-‘covet’: yearning for something belonging to another person.
– ‘vague’: lacking clarity.
Afro-Punk
People
Places
Poverty
Pain
Death
Fine art but still
They can’t measure up
Greenland but still they scatter thorns
That silly sentiment
That old time but void religion
It’s not the gospel
You blasphemers
Jesus wept
Hence the truth
We are no longer in the dark
We are no longer afraid
We will no longer run at the sight
Of your false prophesies
False prophets
Jesus died
Hence the new beginning
Narrative
We are the rebellious generation. Most of us to good use, so we could break free from society’s chains, separate the gospel from religion, break boundaries and create a new epitome; others, simply noise makers. Which side are you?
Used words & terms
-‘sentiment’: perception/conviction.
-‘people, places, poverty, pain’= Death.
Heaven sent
Dearly,
To you and I
Our paths have not crossed
Until we reach our crux
To you my hands will reach
To touch your heart
For us to meet
For us to be and become
The very existence which without me
You cannot create the future
We have since known one another
In our life before
Not the one before us
The one to which I think we had lived
For now it still feels yet as if I know you
More than just this little space
To which our paths have crossed
It still feels as if I’ve loved you
Way before
Now to which our paths have crossed
I remember you
Strangely likely more than I did before
Now to which our paths have crossed
We’ve touched
And it feels yet as if we’ve touched heaven
Perhaps a piece of it in me and you
For now I see you understand this strange chemistry
You see you feel
It is heaven, my Darling
We’ve touched heaven
Narrative
Even if it were to be once in a lifetime I think we all pray for that one person we could share some type of weird connection with, spiritual if you like; very little talking, only feeling.
Used words & terms
-‘crux’: most important point
-‘strange chemistry’: special bond
Peace officers living in cosmopolitan era
When I see a police car
I immediately imagine
The raging sound of shots fired through thin air
A massacre of my blood splatter
Through the ground
Leaving no traces
To track me back to where
I should have been
But cut short by wild wolves
In prestige black clothing
I all of a sudden smell fear close enough
To know they will come for me
Should I not take the other route
I haven’t done any wrong
But so didn’t Kolade Johnson
Or Akeem Akinsanya
Anita Akapson
Ada Ifeanyi
Or the rest of us out here
There are days I want to play tough
Cling onto Fela’s strength
And say I refuse not to put up a fight
I insist to fight today
And live to die tomorrow
Throw my chest out and scream;
‘You can kill my body’
‘But you can’t kill my soul!
But I must be wise
To remember my mother’s words
Never to put up a fight if I must live
To survive a next run
I must run for cover
And find safety in a little cowardice
For gone are the days
Crime had on saggy shorts, singlet and a colored handkerchief
Hanging out their back pocket
There is a new crime in town
And it works for the government
Narrative
Were living in a society where the face of crime isn’t only beholden through the appearances of the thugs and hoodlums as you’d have them but rather in our supposed crime fighters and justice upholders. We no longer fear and run only from the hooligans but also from the ‘popo’ as some folks call them. It’s sad but it is the sore truth.
Used words & terms
-‘massacre’: savage killing
-‘cowardice’: lack courage
No man’s country
I am from no man’s land
I am from a planet out of this world
I am a prophet on mission
No culture can keep me bound
I would grow
I come from all over the corners of the world
I can learn to love my culture
Eventhough it does not fit my education
I can learn to understand its origin
Its ancientness for me to revere
I must learn to know my place
And own it!
If I must claim an heritage
Still I am wild and growing
No history can keep me running through old visions
I am too wild in imagining innovations
To succumb to old time glory
I am from a planet out of this world
I am from no man’s country
Narrative
I am never one to want to feel stuck or dependent on a thing, person or place, I am no addict to anything man made or artificial. I want to believe I am one with a free spirit and a much carefree human being, a passerby, not fully belonging, only owning. Owning my existence, owning to its inevitability, owning my surrender to a higher power, and overall, owning my truth whatever shape it may come. I am a traveller at heart, mind and spirit too, I am never one to stunt in growth and refuse flexibility for life in its fullness.
Used words & terms
-‘revere’: respect
-‘succumb’: give in
Afro beat Presentation
Enter in patient
Yet madness in your thoughts
Face ethnically painted
With intention and purpose
Proceed to annihilate
Any suspect to the idea
You came to play
Wiggle the pant palazzo around
But slowly so they could see every print
Mindless of the band
So they know you have the keys
To their souls to make them function
Precisely and perfection
Be conscious of your tongues
As it is a symbol of your identity
Claim it!
Be it, the only education they get from your parade
Do not fail to express it
The freedom on how you express it
Would tell whether or not they dance to it
Be sure to make them dance
And be slaves to the sound of liberation
Only your presence can serve
This will tell whether or not you live or die
A legacy
Narrative
I believe every African is an artist. Be it you’re dancing, singing, chanting, writing, speaking, or be it the fact that you’re just a part of the hype team, you play a role. Long as you’re not sitting with the others and watching us continuingly build legacies one show at a time. It is our identity, we are show stoppers!
Used words & terms
– ‘ethnically’: tribal
-‘annihilate’: wipe out
– ‘parade’: show
Wild wild hair
Wild wild hair
I am not my hair
Wild wild hair
Watch the way you turn
Wild wild hair
I am not to blame
Mystical as it seems
It does belong to me
It grew right through my head
Crazy as it seems
God knows every curl
Wild wild hair
Tangle away
The world is much too straightforward
Bless it with wonder
Wear it with power
Black power!
Narrative
However we choose to express our own kind of beautiful as it best suites or fit us, it is our own prerogative. Very often we see black women being measured by how their hair appears to be very unlike what is thought a woman’s hair should look like; just like her skin having a natural hair is yet another medium the society seeks to question her nature.
Used words & terms
-‘Mystical’: beyond ordinary
-‘too straightforward’: unadventurous
No good girl alive
They say she is a fallacy
A myth that could never exist
They say when she returns home
To her comfort zone
All hell breaks loose
There is no good girl alive
All are wolves in sheep skin
She finds herself on the ground
The world’s weight on her shoulders
Who do I become?
So I could be loved and understood
Who do I need to emulate
A preceding order
So I could seize to be the centre of your attention
The one you seek to slowly put out
And then piece back together
To become the exact product of your illusion and speculation
You’re right and am wrong
There is no good girl alive
All you have are virgins by heart
And of course we know the truth!
We know you
Like every other girl here that has walked these streets
Claiming to be introverts
But are actually wild cards in the scheme of themes
Themes vividly reflective on screens
Portraying girls as puppets and sex toys for fun and toiling
Never too much educating
Mostly girls in lingerie and very little activity
They say she belongs on the scene
Where she could be seen
More adventure less becoming
Who needs honesty these days?
There is no good deed in anyone
She hits the ground even harder
Uncertainty hits to the teeth
The world’s weight still unyielding
Her mind now glitching
It suddenly dawns on her
She is upset
Torn into two
Lonely and abused
She now works the street at the palm of her hands
The way the world intends
She comes home appease
Now she realizes what you need
A girl without her truth
Narrative
Generally, some people expect the worse in a person because for some insane reason it makes them less confronted by their own conscience. No one is perfect they say, and yet one striving is only pretending to be what they’re not.
Used words & terms
-‘fallacy’: delusion
– ‘preceding’: past
– ‘introverts’: antisocial
– ‘themes’: subject matter
– ‘glitching’: malfunctioning
A short story
The Traveler
I often wonder where I would be buried when I die.
That hopefully somewhere even in my death would feel like home,
Hometown
I mean everyone is always talking about where they spent most their lives growing up,
Where they hid their first broken tooth,
What streets they road their first bikes,
Who their first buddy was
But me,
Am a traveler
I threw my first broken tooth by a bush at a relative’s home, swung my arms open, took to singing a self composed hymn;
‘my teeth has broken, den! den!
de! den! de!
my teeth has broken, den! den!
de! den! de!’
Smiling what was left of my milky teeth
Buddies were for losers. Why have them only to lose them.
At first we meet on mutual grounds but then end up on crossed roads. Little telephone calls might stitch to the other end of the line for a while but cuts through long distance breaks our fragile connection, and then we become history.
And a bike, I never technically rode one. I just watched as the other kids rode by the streets one summer at a friend’s home waving their kites through the skies that seemed like spiting flies through my eyes.
The sun would always shine on them.
Shine on the metal strings above of their sprawling wheels and make them blaze flashing lights. But never on me.
Never on my spotting little eyes. What a mean Sun!
Its discriminatory of shy daisies, it craved wild life. Wild like those other kids running up and down the hippy streets, worse than jack and Jill, worse than Turbo.
I did have a home of three before, just me, my Ma and Sis.
Beautiful as could be, sharing a love so pure as the very God that bound us.
And even then we were broken. Breached with a distant gap life’s course marked on our way, on our destinies.
It tested our faith, our heart, and our commitment to love as a family. But we did find some way to mend our hearts back together. We did find some way to remember love.
But never our home,
Never hometown.
Now my Sis is in the uptowns, and am with Ma, downtown!
Now like a ripped painting I feel my Sis running away from our colorful artistic chemistry, our family painting on the wall, ancient but forever love strong.
Why is she ripping her beautiful fair color away from this painting? Why is she running from this beautiful chemistry, why is she running away from home?
Why is she not downtown with me and Ma? I know we were broken before but we did find some way to mend our hearts back together.
Home is incomplete, with Sis in the uptowns.
Although it’s still home with Ma in it, but without us complete it still feels like traveling.
Without neighbors like friends and friends like family it still feels like a walk through.
No long contacts, just packed bags, and long prayers for the next trip.
Travelling back it was harder to keep up with events, and emotions, worse. They were like rushing wheels in motion both descending and ascending one after the other.
Even in my sleep they would haunt me down. Like a chase I was the catch. Never really heading somewhere specific yet running like one with a goal, with ambition.
Probably an ambition to finally settle. But how could I possibly when I was always running away from the catch, running from the final destination, wherever that was.
I realized how much faces differed, as well as their actions.
A synergy of my mind and body I invented through my travels. I even got to ascribe colors and images to actions.
Like for example, when am shown love, I picture the sun’s fiery moist dripping into the puffy clouds as they would pop and glow in abundance.
And when love would hurt and pain piercing, the clouds would fall in grayish agony, as the sun would eclipse, opening the flood gates, then my tears would follow.
I could hardly keep memories. Memories without Ma and Sis in it. Each event just seemed to wither away from my mind, but somehow never the bad stuff, never the awful experiences the Hosts put Sis and me through. It was hard to forget those. Never my tearing eyes, it was hard to forget how I remembered my vain lifting through my head, or the painful chills that would grip my tender skin and cover them with bumps.
I couldn’t control it neither could I stop it. It was always rush hour every hour. You couldn’t count seconds that turned minutes. The sun is up and then suddenly its dawn.
Even in my dreams I would picture myself a running car, sometimes in it and sometimes it. The running car, the gear, the wheels, the force, the speed, again the running car. I had opened doors and reached places I’d never even been before or probably places Ma was yet to take me.
Yet somehow I loved the rush. Somehow the pain was bitter sweet. Probably because it made an excuse to run when it required I stayed. To escape tragedy even when it required I fought.
Or maybe it was Ma. Maybe it was the way she always said I love you through every heart ache, every “Am sorry but you have to stay here for a while”. Or the promises she could hardly keep but always recovered through every kiss on my burning cheeks.
I sometimes made wishes in hope they’d come through for me on days I couldn’t pray, because even in my prayers I could hardly utter clear words as they would sound like tongues.
And unlike some people I believed in them, wishes!
Wishes like racing horses even I could ride if I dreamed, if I believed.
Still if you were to ask Ma she’ll tell you I was a handful, well most times. Cause my scars and stitches made these scripts more easily. Even I could remember the pestles and particular hand swings Ma took for a specialty. Yet as tough as iron as I was Ma invented a mechanism as she knew my weakness.
Biscuits.
Trust me if biscuits were weapons, then I think we might have ourselves an infant revolutionary.
I was a sucker for biscuits and Ma knew it too, so she’d bribe me on every occasion she got, whatever she possibly wanted me to do she could.
But Sis! She was a different ball game, she was bullet proof, and nothing could get through her, not even biscuits. And Ma knew it too, so she’d scold her, probably because she wished she could just like biscuits, or sweets, anything possible to make leaving easier.
Sis knew too well how to convey feelings, she still does. Her master craft. Is like the movie ‘Cinderella’. ‘Have courage and be kind’ was her slogan and was still even at daunting moments with her wicked step mother and lunatic sisters. I remember Sis would be so pissed and wouldn’t eat for days after Ma had left and unfortunately for her the Hosts could care less. But though Sis hated to see Ma leave each time, deep down in her heart she knew Ma had to go places without us so we could survive and someday be independent. It was bitter but it was the truth, we were dependent.
The Hosts would say I was stronger than Sis cause I could take Ma leaving, but the truth was, I just loved biscuits; Well most days! But other days, biscuits could go to hell and bake. If I didn’t want to stay, the whole neighborhood would know there was a new kid on the block. And Ma knew that too, so she’d spank me, and then pet me to sleep, and when I would wake, she was gone.
Oh boy! How that used to hurt like hell. It would hurt so bad I couldn’t even cry but mope and promise myself never to sleep again, or better yet never to trust Ma again. Even my infant mind knew the word was betrayal. Ma had fooled me and it felt like Dad.
But there were some days ours was like a Spartan movie. You know when the parents leave their kids to some combat instructor and they have no choice but to be brave for their parents plus the whole of Spartan even though it’s highly hysterical cause they’re just kids, but then it’s like the tradition. Yes! Picture that.
Still even in that scene I would always cut and stare at Ma with the most child manipulating look there ever was, expecting she’d feel guilty and take Sis and I with her.
I would hold her hands for long, pierce my eyes into hers that maybe for some reason she might see my hurt and change her mind. But her eyes would pierce in mine even stronger and then I’ll know.
She was helpless and I ought to pity her.
Then all of a sudden courage would rise within me to be strong for Ma. Letting her know I would only stay because she was helpless and I loved her. Gosh! I hated to see Ma leave.
Most of the Hosts were never as nice as Ma was. And they would treat Sis and me very badly but I knew I had to be strong for Ma and I knew Sis knew it too even with the firm look on her face.
That was Sis.
That was her way of hiding her weakness, because when Ma was far gone I know she would cry in the shower and at night when everyone but I, laying beside her was awake.
I’d pet her but her tears would be contagious and before I said ‘Jack Robinson’ we both were crying like bells. And when our heads ache we would take a break, dry our tears, cuddle each other, but our cuddling would trigger memories, so we would cry some more all through the night until we slept.
There was this time Sis broke into singing admits our crying, I reluctantly joined in and before I said ‘Jonny Walker’ we were both laughing, singing, and still crying.
Silly Sis! Of all the songs in the world there possibly was to sing, she picked ‘Sweet Mother’. Perfect!
Now singing amidst crying was rituals to me and Sis, there were even times certain lyrics would skip our minds but we will hum and say a whole lot of rubbish through the rest of the song. We knew this too, but we could care less, long as it flowed and our hearts were close, we were singing.
I remember I once told Ma I wanted a job as a singer in the big city where she worked so I could help out and make us stay together as a family but in response she laughed and said I was going to be her ‘Miss World’ when I grew up. Silly Ma, still trying to fool me, even I knew that wasn’t a real job and she would only say that to make me smile and see myself special.
When summer came they were like a break in Heaven from hell.
With angels singing and warmly welcoming Sis and I to yet another leave from terror. I mean it! The Hosts were not nice at all, not even a little. There was this one that would make us use hand fans on her till she slept, and when we fell slightly as sleep thinking she was asleep, all we heard were rushing slaps on our faces waking us back on duty, the duty of putting the old lady to sleep with our bare hands. Am talking back scratching, mosquito repelling, keeping the breeze from blowing the blanket off her royal highness, keeping an eye up for snakes, other reptiles, lions, you know it’s a jungle out here, a whole bunch of lists, time won’t permit me to remember other relative duties but we did work magic, even that Host would tell you. There is nothing like having a bunch of kids surround you like a bouquet and treat you like a flower in need of protecting. Crazy Human!
Only the mornings lived to tell the bitter story of the night. When we first moved in with this Host Sis and I thought it was a onetime thing and tomorrow would be better, normal. But then tomorrow came as so did weeks unto months, until it became a routine, a job!
Here I was looking for a job and I did get one, not what I wanted but at least I was helping Ma, for the thought that Ma was still alive and I could make it back to her was a hope not deferred.
Every home Sis and I lived always tried to make us conform to their ways and beliefs. Which is relatively understandable, but the twists and turns in trying to adjust to new norms and notions still in stunt recovery of the previous was literally breath taking. It was certainly impossible to have a personality with all of the constant relocating.
And now our new home is proof of the meaninglessness of a mapped architectural building. They say a home is what you make of it, but tell that to Sis whose down in the uptowns and won’t come downtown, it’ll take an entire manuscript to have her convinced she needed time with her family, an obligated need.
I know she feels her trace isn’t marked on the four walls of this new building but if only she’d look deeper, look beyond the structural architecture of this house and realize every brick laid were platforms of our memories beforehand. She is always here. Her beautiful fair color is still on every family painting both physically and whole heartedly. She is loved, irreplaceable. Not even my chocolaty dark skin could compare to her chocolaty vanilla. She should be adorned. It’s easy to love her cause Ma made love our first foundation. God first, family second. And since God was love and Ma made us know love it was easier to know God, easier to love him. So when Dad was gone and Ma was our only parent I never felt alone. People would tease me and say I was incomplete without a masculine figure in my feminine family, but I never for once felt alone or needy. And for some this might sound cliché but these types of things seemed special in my world. Dad had to leave cause he went chasing after a life he thought was better but couldn’t share with us and I never blamed him, doing right just wasn’t his thing, and I suppose you never lose what you never had. Still over the years I tried to build tension and hate towards him as the world expects me to but the love in my heart won’t make space for it, it’s like healing before hurt, I already knew what to do and how to feel before it happened, remember that synergy of my mind and body. So letting the thought of Dad not being in our lives slip through my mind very lightly was as easy as typing these lines on my notepad.
For me, love is all. Nothing human can separate me from Ma or Sis. Ours is like eternity, till death do us part. And yet again these aren’t just a platitude of words but actual truth. There was this song Ma always made Sis and I sing to her and no matter where we were, no matter who was around, we had to sing it. Back then it felt like singing just a normal poem but when I started to grow older I realized each syllable had a tying oath coined into every line of words.
‘I love my Mama, my Mama loves me”
No circumstances can change my opinion
There’s no denying, there’s no defying
Ours is forever until the end’
And indeed over the years there have been circumstances but none ever strong enough to break through.
And in my life’s distractions I have often considered taking a trip to my father’s land, but I get stuck in weary isolation I didn’t belong there or anyway else for that matter, cause there are no memories to hold unto there, no soil to trace, no stories to picture in my imagination of where it is my blood line is from, none but self made promises. Promises to make to my future bunnies, promises of a soil, a neighborhood, a bike, a street, Hometown.
But me,
I still question where it is I could actually call hometown, being a traveler.
Am somewhere in the middle of nowhere, still trying to settle and when time lapses, and Jerusalem is only few travels away, I fear I might be buried in a strange land and not my father’s, now I’m in a state whereby the thought of death, judgment or the grave sent no fear down my spine rather the inevitable thought of been buried in a strange location makes my heart restless.
Although it’s very often I find myself with the resolution I’ll never stop running, never stop searching, just like King David said ‘a chasing after wind’. Maybe there is no final destination, not for me, not for Ma, Sis, or even anyone. Maybe the word home was just a fictional term cooked up by Tom hanks when he found himself on a strange island and sought to conceive a fable he wasn’t alone so he could keep from going insane. Maybe home is me, pieces of myself I mould into a structured building, not of Ma, not Sis, not of anyone. Cause when they’re gone for a while I still remain stuck in running motion and no matter how long I keep seeking to settle I’ll never find content, I’ll never stop travelling, going places, meeting faces, seeking answers to questions I might never find, which is all good, but when I find Jerusalem, maybe then I’ll settle.
Ok! Am getting too deep; this is about me been a traveler.
Narrative
Life is the most beautiful situation that could ever occur to man. I believe our bodies are just as free as our souls and spirit. I could be in a daunting situation at some point but then in a split second my spirit is far travelled to a safe haven it seeks to explore. So unless I give in and follow through to where its leading me because I know it is always right and truth giving I would never truly experience the universe and how beautiful and more so powerful I could be in it. Therefore my thoughts are covenanted to seeing the world as it truly is; all of it belongs to me. No culture, no past, or hometown could hold me down from truly experiencing its fullness. I would always be a traveler. Truly!
Used words & terms
-‘Hosts’: guardians
– ‘bunnies’: symbolizes children
-‘Jerusalem’: heaven
The soul of the church
Born again
Like born supremacy
We live like royals
While our brothers’ wait for tables
I know we all can’t ride horses
And the sun can’t rise on the suburbs
The children are too ghetto
To know to walk on plain landmarks
The earth is marked
And the lots have been cast
For richer the power
For poorer the good God
Mercy could override wealth
But the church has been made perverse
The world could purge from sin
But the good preacher is antisocial
Hence the lost sheep has no tail
Once there were some as the beatitudes
Who knew to fellowship with sincerity of hearts
No possessions held back
Just angels working the earth
They pushed the good word
Fought enough for us to see
Enough to share the ultimate suffering
For the soul of the church
Is the revival –
Narrative
Nothing in itself is living for its self Paul said; whether or not you believe in God. That goes for us too that believe; to understand the concept of togetherness and even more equality in the eyes of the Universe. So when you start to feel in control and resolute you can take a step back and check whom you’re pulling along.
Used words & term
‘Suburbs’: outskirts of a city
‘Override’: rule against
‘Beatitudes’: blessed
Little Country Dreams
Darkened by the sun
Weighed by the moon
Kissed by a star
Along the see sea ship
Silly rhythms
Flaky rhymes
Deadly dreams
For I am planting seed
Still in autumn
It will rain this morning
Stone cold water
But I can’t remember the last I saw your face glow in beautiful wonder
Smiling like the world could seize forever
If you deprive it of your kindly tender
Special kind as you are
Lost in dreams
Of modern aspirations
And found in fatal coincidence
No longer the girl I used to know
One content with the simple things
Her city had to offer
No longer the girl and her little
Country dreams
But kadara
The typical African girl
Sold to over sea men
On a see sea ship
With nothing but a box of ideas
Of the American dream
And a note of prayer from her mother
In hope she’ll remember
Where she came from
To know where the ship will draw the water
But it’s raining now
Stone cold water
Yet alas I remember
Why I had those little dreams
And cherish them
Narrative
Little country dreams would save a life. It’s not to say having big dreams is something to be feared or avoided but let your intentions and motivations be made known to yourself in clear honesty in order to be responsible for future outcomes; just so you don’t mistake anxiety for desire and greed for adventure, just checking on you.
Used words & terms
‘Flaky’: unusual
‘Planting seed’: taking steps
‘Autumn’: a season when leaves fall from the tree
‘Ship will draw the water’: stop ship
Put it in my jar
Lonely asses
Shabbily filling in this hazardous role play
You can make up all the terms in the world
Encyclopedia and all
But you still can’t put it in my jar
Am penny wise
Even I can’t believe this savagery discipline
I mean a craving of barbaric splendor’
I suppose it’s my relentless star gazing
Am dreaming too much
I can’t tolerate non fiction
Am too fixated in feeling
The worldly heights won’t be enough
When I get tired of its limits
I promise I’ll make my own
I pray I’ll make you feel my groove
And let the earth be moved
And displaced from its place
For I put every consciousness
And understanding into my jar
To know what’s worth keeping
Worth feeling
Am the best version of me
Scars and all
This I could know to always treasure
More so what Ma said
‘Whatever you want to be baby girl; you can’
Here’s one worth putting in my jar
Narrative
I am my mother’s daughter. Nothing is special if Ma says its trash, which is all it’ll be in my eyes. Cause unlike many I see through them. When am worn out and pressured to a fall, she’ll pick me up and be my divine seer and unlike mine they’ve known time.
Used words & terms
-‘shabbily’: mean/ungenerous manner
-‘asses’: fools
In glorious war II (he)
He prayed to the Oak tree
The one he looked unto
Amidst the battle spree
The barracks is no home
For a man who works the soil
He’ll meet his demise
On till floor
Wet!
He confesses to Mother Nature
‘I am not a hero
I sold my soul to war
So I could seize to be my father’s son
Sir Sidney Black
An extreme Nazi
I know this is no glorious act
But of hateful motive
I have a lover back home
Whose heart I placed on hold
And hope she’d learn to forget me
For I cannot return home
And have the town celebrate a bitter man
A hero who had their good intentions
I must accomplish my sole mission
For the battle grounds are not only tales of zealous men
But also the broken ones
Who have found a sinless way to suicide
In the battle spree
I swear my beautiful Ellie
I fight till death
I was no coward to my enemy’s pursuit
I made sure he made it count
Until my end I knew to pray
For a space for me beyond the stars
So I could know to shine
And glory past sorrow
For a new life
In a whole new world
My dreams will taunt me
Who am I to fool?
Your love hunts me down
Narrative
A continuing poem on ‘In glorious’ war but this one takes a turn as it is the ‘Inglorious’ war which connotes something without honor. It shows a man in between the battles of his dreams and reality with no courage to fight through either.
Used words & terms
-‘zealous’: active
-‘pursuit’: following
-‘nazi’: intolerant
Moonlight Kisses
Dark nights
For long walks
Sunset sky
For peradventure love
Smoke out of our fire now
Milestone built for this silly show
We’ve made a fool out of love
Cursed it to the moon and now
Back again by the sunset
Where it all went sideways
This little boy says he is in love with me
Wonder what chronicles wrote such
Scripts as the ones for
Coincidental love
Created here, just now
By the moon
I can’t trust this stimulus
It won’t last us till morning
Maybe it’s the moon
That cast a spell on us
And made us stars to this mesmerising scene
Were shining now
This is too scary for romance
Your mind is too tired from sweating and courage needless to spare
You’ll grow grey hair
And I will grow children that’ll make me old and grey
I suppose we could find where this two fates meet
So we could free ourselves from this misery
And go home
Where reality will save
Narrative
I am never one to live for the moment if am truly honest with myself, am too obsessed with my future being bright and free of consequential regrets; like the fate of an unborn toddler. I don’t know, maybe I ought to learn that.
Used words & terms
-‘peradventure’: by chance
-‘mesmerising’: spellbind/hypnotize
Sleep
Sleep before food
Food before pleasure
Sleep is friend to the soul
It will grant you rest only death can permit
Peace beyond solemn kisses
Tears off old skin for new
Sleep is treasure to the uncanny
Makes for a pathway
Transacting evil and good
Sleep is priceless for dreamers
Gives room for more of the impossible
Sleep is like gold
Even golden by how well you line your sheets
Sleep like meeting God on a subway
Riding to a diner for a sandwich
Before getting a quick coffee from Jesus by the counter
But still wake up in unbelief
Ye of little faith
Narrative
Sleep is my favorite food. I strongly believe it’s a gift from God to rest our soul, body, and spirit from the troubles of life once in a while. Sleep is everything.
Used words & terms
-‘uncanny’: extraordinary
Broken People
Your father told your mother
You couldn’t walk round the park no longer
As if he knew your heart
Will lie gently on my side porch
When the moon was up
My mother told my sister
To tell me
She’s all we have
Don’t let a silly boy run your life
Like your father did mine
But Mother do you mind
Am terrified
Am too far gone in love
I fear I might runway
And make you cry
But were broken people
Living on the edge of fateful circumstance
Our hearts are built with gold
But shattered through immorality
Immorality long before
Our eyes knew the sun
Long before the stars knew to tell what was to come
Long before death knew first love
Romeo and I, Juliet
Broken people
Broken souls
But how can two broken people fall in love
Unless they fall apart
Narrative
Some of us come from the other end of the sun. You know I mean where the sun sets from behind and you could only see its shadow and not its glow. It’s not that it fails to shine for all its cause we don’t see it from where we stand; we’re built differently.
Used words & terms
-‘run’: ruin
-‘-mmorality’:
Blind at Bethsaida
Rabbi,
I see people
Walking like trees
Seeking pasture
Wandering in vigorous ambition
On a purposeful mission
But destined to fatality
We all could die today
The sun could seize to shine
Wither like saw dust
Leave the earth purging in beautiful ambiance
Must I forever vision immortality?
Or favour the believe I need a reason
To position my mind
In a way my spirit can relate
‘There must be an end to this body’
‘There must be a reason to die’
I want the world to end
So I can be forever young
I want heaven just as much
As I need saving
Maybe now more than likely
I see the light
The sun is shining
The sky is blue
I can see clearly
I know hope for glory
Narrative
This was the man at Bethsaida in his own term but this is me if you picture a person once blind as to the way things are and have been. A mixture of trembling and not truly understanding fellowship through my own eyes but the one the world explains, because I know they do so of their own context and guiding. And the fact that am seeking and searching for myself doesn’t make me resentful but truly in love.
Used words & terms
-‘vigorous’: physically active
-‘ambiance’: influence of an atmosphere
Prose
Flaws of Religion
What is it some of the Christians say about religion that saves them from persecution. I know, they say they do not practice religion but Christianity. I find that hard to comprehend cause if you were someone like me once lost in the four walls of some of these Christian gathering today you realise the vagueness of that debate. Come to think of isn’t religion the practice of Christianity and more so the general term for different supernatural practices. And by Supernatural I mean whatever your God is and whatever makes you sleep at night. Islam, Buddhism, Judaism, etc are all types of religion. But here we have some of the Christians who have chosen to follow the short and wide road almost to the full and righteous conviction.
Let us not confuse ourselves all in the name of civilisation and have ourselves to blame. There is nothing wrong with being a little religious, however you choose to pick your personal code of conduct to your style of living could be a form of routine you religiously follow. Every religion has its principles, dos and don’ts that they live by in order that they truly fellowship with their divine order without any opposing body questioning its existence.
It is true some religions have contradicted from their source and blown up to rather extreme degrees, living like servants in church buildings when they ought to be kings in palaces. But it is not to say diminishing one person’s religious activities lessens the strife from the other cause each one has its flaws.
At the end of the day it’s a choice between good and evil. You may choose evil and feel it’ll make your life easier (good luck with that) and you may pretend to choose good and then water it down to make it feel less sacrificial.
But I guess for some I might say laziness and lack of willingness to subject themselves to rigorous and true fellowship as oppose to living it to their spiritual advisors causes them to funkinize the gospel a little bit. Well am a believer and not a Christian myself so I suppose we all might go to hell.
Narrative
Excuse the last quote if it makes you itch but I suppose realizing the thin line between life and death makes it less breathtaking to use the word; and yet no one can make the decision for either fates but ourselves. Christianity is a type of religion same as Islam, Judaism etc. Most of the time I notice how Christianity takes more blows as regards its entire existence and beforehand and I realize how people result ways to lighten the weight on how the world sees it; like a simple misconception.
Used words & terms
-‘vagueness’: not coherent in meaning
-‘rigorous’: strict
Everything Nothing
Everything! Everything!
Nothing!
Says the teacher
Everything is nothing
For souls return to the hands
Of the one who bares them
Everything is nothing
To we that surf the earth in haste
Living like super humans,
Our best selves we hope to explore to the limit
Everything is nothing
Gaining power rival to none
And sitting on worldly seats
To suppress the truth of extinction
Everything Everything
You see, is nothing
Purge yourself from forgery
Of thoughts of special humanness
Nothing is of much value
If you look down from space
Every everything
Everything is nothing
Who am I to fool?
Expecting that I could live in peace
In a world slowly passing me by
Each passing time
Everything is nothing
Everything everything
Eternity
Everything is nothing
Narrative
Everything nothing, everything is vanity. I am an advocate of a better world where we could live in absolute peace and harmony and I sometimes even get too overboard in dreaming things only possible in the afterlife. But either ways my conscious awareness of the meaninglessness of life makes me understand what’s worth dying for.
Used words & terms
-‘extinction’: no longer in existence
-‘forgery’: altercation
EPILOGUE
They say what we seek is seeking us, but how about I tell you what is seeking you needs your courage and persistence to believe it’s meant for you and that the fact that its meant for you doesn’t mean it can’t be taken from you if you don’t follow up with it. It will leave you and go unto the next, it’s a gift but it works with time. ‘Knock before you enter for the love of poetry’ is me seeking the knowledge behind truly seeking and finding purpose in the process and how that might not often make sense in the making I hope the universe sees my pursuit.
Salvaged thoughts
When I close my eyes
I see tiny lights
Thousands of them
They multiple
The space is black
I go up and up
Never a destination
Only ascending
I wonder if it’s a curse
Or a channel to God
A pathway to Him
Only I know
Only I can see
I might tell you to close your eyes
But I know you may not see it
I pray you may not see it
So it could be special
A light to my world
Or maybe it’s all in my head
Maybe I go up because I am falling
Maybe from where I stand is upside down
In a concede position
That I am only illustional
I close my eyes once again
But I couldn’t see it
It disappeared
It comes when I least expect it
I don’t know what to make of it
But I want to see God
Water Melon
I think fruit tastes better
When you’re in love
And love seems less complicated
When you know God
I suppose the thought of not
Feeling the sense of doubt in the other person
Rises from the conviction of the need for sacrifice
Everyone should be willing to give up something
Or the phrases bear fruit
Even in place of desert grounds and dry bones coming to life
Long as you understand the concept
Of water
A little tear
A little laughter
A little more sharing of the simplest things
Like a slice of watermelon
