Rivers have always flowed from frosty Caps on lonely mountains, down through tired Valleys, washing debris, trees, and bringing Life wherever they go. Splashing around, The water winds round rocks that would stop It. But it continues, tunneling through hills, Unstoppable. The river of life gets dashed against rock But also smiles round the same rock. Smile, camera. You switch on your phone and the f Calls your fingers into a world of glossy Glam. Flowers are more flowery, And trees are more greenery, And meals are more beefery, But teal seem to be in the tealery As each image tells you this truth: "You ain't sh....opping at the right shops! Your meals are too ordinary. Even your Guardian angel must be a frail-looking Nerd without the brains to match the title, But with just the brawn that can't lift an axle. You too don't have the six pack to share With friends; the thumb icon seems to point Down just for your life, Hearts for their smiles, Smiles, camera. Who cares where the river runs really straight, Uneventful, looking lazy, like mere luck? My Geography teacher, with his spitting glasses Told me (while I covered my face from, you know...) And showed me the meanders, the rapids, the water- Falls, the deltas, oxbow lakes, tributaries, And I asked: "What do we call this straight part?" And as he spoke, my mind floated away to possible names: "Never on social media episodes" "No need to take a picture moments" "Too ordinarily nice for TV" "Guttural silly laughter, not smiles" "No smiles, no camera" For we only pause to take a breath at The punctuation, That fills the river, the river, of life. Then we extrapolate from those singular Moments of beauty, happiness, whateverness, And assume that the tree bark is just As green as the leaves we glimpsed. Walt Disney figured this out really fast, And Mickey danced on the pages. You ain't sh... owing your talent. They are. Because that picture said so, And a less-than-a-second capture of light Is worth more than the ebbs and flows of your life, Like that punctuation wasn't part of A longer sentence... Oh! That we may all see that The river of life gets dashed against rock But always smiles round the same rock. Smile, camera (c) nyonglema
All posts by nyonglema
Special
What would the world wield for me without you? The sun will only set grim and blue The rain will batter my glasses too The clouds will hide the joys I knew The wind will dash my hopes of something new. You met a geeky boy with glasses screaming "Neeerd", and yet you gave me shot, You built me from a little clay pot Straight from the potter's spinning top Adding dashes, lines, colours and dots I met a special pearl, all polished, and Polished as well for near perfect as You were, no creature ever has Not needed a touch of more. More sass, More glitter in the smile below your stars. On this day so special for you and me, Nothing I do can match what I mean To say through the gestures you've seen, For there's nowhere else, no-one else I'd rather be than here with you. My love, as the clock adds grace to each Day you live, I pray your smiles grow Larger, that your flowery eyes glow Much brighter, That our seedling love hold Much longer than we promised 11 years ago. (c) nyonglema
Cancel Culture
How does a mustard seed appear before us? Not as a tree, with leaves tickling falling Sun rays into laughter in greens and yellows, And rainbows in beautiful forest lushness. A man once invited his friends to cannibalize Their way to heaven; offering himself to them, And their stomachs popped out their eyes And spun them round to perceived sanity, And muttering they walked away from their belief, Now too gory to hold, leaving without any grief. Sensing danger, he tapped the hands of the tag team, Where temptation was strong, and the flesh Was being torn for fear of tearing at its seams On the way to the renovation store up the hill. Oh how sound they slept and ignored his behest, And slept and slept like all this was just a test. As time stood still to catch his final breath Of pardon, as Word became Word, and flesh stayed To feel the Earth shudder at this one death, Darkening, rending, only three teared, dismayed. From 12 and more, just 3 saw the spear hit mercy Between the ribs. Only 3 dared to show their faces. As the body formed after a miracle three days later, And those who feared came back to said body, Renewing their faith, his uncle had to make encounter With truth while walking away from perceived insanity: As muttering, he and partner walked in disbelief At this so-crazy-to-behold story told to hide grief. How does a mustard seed appear before us? As a mustard seed. It feels the tree eager to burgeon, And comparing itself to what it must show, It knows the truth, and as the world lies With counter-examples and stories of revenge, It holds the truth. It doesn't call for the help Of other seeds. It knows who made it and where Allegiance, hope and growth lie. How does a mustard seed appear before us? One seed at a time, for it's not how many, But if any would stand for God, for Truth Even as the hill promises you Gehenna. (c) nyonglema
Juneteeth
The waves pull at the lugs of the wind-smiling boat
Where jokes are thrown, and hope of home stays afloat.
But beneath the wood, in dark damp despair
The souls piled in bodies in chains gasp for air.
Captured in fields of butterfly-filled chanting grass
Where children's smiles once lit love in these paths,
Now wishing death, escape, drowning, as the waves tossed
Their past away, carrying them to the land of the lost.
Finally off the cramped hell of human faeces and decay,
On a dais where bids are called, and theyget whisked away
To serve the farm. This was freedom from seaborne pain
Just to be enslaved, and cut and hurt once again.
Their brothers off to Arabia, or further to the same fate
Had warned of this predicament, and now they're in their state
Hoping for a day when a heart is changed and the impossible
Becomes blood on this continent to unhinge their shackles.
***********
What's freedom?
The shackles have fallen off the scars
That held back my breath.
Opportunity smiles the seduction of the 14th of February
And I say yes, reach out, looking to a future, looking
Beyond to joy, beyond death.
The eagle soars to survey and seek its prey, as I ride
Peacefully building a future where my kids will be eagles
To pray the prayers that freed my heart, to dream the dream
That Washington, Lincoln and Martin Luther King dream, and
Put the whip back into its sheath.
***********
But my brothers are still stuck.
I watch as I soar how the nest of worms appeals to them.
The chain is gone.
They seek a new master to shelter them from the
Predators of the world;
They call to this master to take their cross, and bear
It, and give them some cotton to feed their fears.
Melanin comes to the table.
He builds a bull of gold, and they bow.
"Oh Melanin, you brought us out of the slavery in Egypt
Out of the Slavery in Libya, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait
Out of the bowels of the slave ships on the Atlantic,
You brought us out of slavery,
Now enslave us to your will.
Make us wholly thine. Where you command we will go"
So he did.
And beautifully decorated by their bull,
Now, their lives matter.
(c) nyonglema
I Matter
Not because of the carbon complexes that Stuck in my skin block out some rays And hide me in dark pictures or from sad days. Not because my nose is lots different from Your pointy one, my nostrils swim On my face, arms spreading at my every whim Not because of my hair, so fine it weaves Itself into landscapes of rolling hills, Or tangos as tightly as two lovers' wills Not because I'm different from you, and like him, Not because I'm not from where you are, where They don't look like me when I look everywhere. No. I matter because I breathe a breath not mine. I matter because of the will I have received Which is mine, to drive this body so a-grieved By the rain of darts that life piles on me. I matter because nobody tells me what to think Or whom to hate, carrying their lead in my heart Like Newton's hair, to folly and the coroner's cart. No. I matter because once one so crazy bore a cross That I may matter, no matter what I looked like. I matter because I can forgive and reach across. (c) nyonglema
Pick your heroes
Does the victim deserve justice or medal?
I'm in the confessionary as petals
Fall off the flower of my redemption.
The litany's long, but who cares if one
More sin piles on, for this cleanses all.
Knee caps listen to my sins as vocal
Chords chirp them out, petal by petal
Till the bud shrivels and browns away,
Promising me hope for a brand new day
In the death of what was, to what will
Grow. As my breath ceases to spill
I glimpse my sins start to melt away.
Now glorify, forget my worst crime days
And adorn you garments with my face.
Start frays, may your kids live my way.
(c)nyonglema
Patience #NoahArk
Flap away and as your wings survey
The drying death below, tell me:
What do you see?
Do the bloated barks of leafless trees,
Brown in death, and laden with grief
Seem anew to breathe?
Do the fungi grow in coloured sheathes
On trees that felled by water swam before,
But now rest ashore?
Oh Raven, Raven, only water above all else
You saw, all around you one ocean swells?
Flap away and as your wings survey
The drying death we know, search around,
For dry ground.
Do the torrents that tossed us far and wide
Now slow and ebb as the tide begins to drop
Beneath mountain tops?
Do the oceans now divide like post-storm clouds
Up above, and sip back behind the rocks
That held them locked?
Oh Dove, dear Dove, only water above all else
You saw, all around you one ocean swells?
Well flap away and once again survey
The drying death that haunts us night and day
And find a way.
Oh, you found an olive start to live again,
As the sun bedazzled each leaf in emeralds
Set in gold walls?
Oh, you found strands of green to build a nest
To start anew nature's run which took a break
For 40 days!?
Oh Dove, oh Dove, if only again the emerald shone through day
Once again to say the fear has been whisked away with pain
And humans can carry on life in a new akin to the old way
Out of the nest, to neighbours to love and break bread again
(c) nyonglema
Minority #identityPolitics
The TV is telling me a movie story, But I can't relate. Nobody in there looks like me. Even the games I play have been carefully Curated to exclude me. My day to day life Is not on the walls of the backgrounds I Shoot at. Not even the enemies look like My daily struggles, But I play on. Artificial intelligence tests Miss my demographic, pushing out machines I Can barely relate to, bearing the fake smiles That poke through my skin in public spaces where The world expects me to blend in, to grab a chair Into their special lounge, where only I and my peers Weren't Invited. Yet I'm blamed for the crimes that are committed, And the police won't hesitate to test their suppositions On me, for no matter what I do, no matter my position, I must have stolen this car, and everything else as well. My kind has committed some egregious crimes that swell Above all the good I do in my community. Going to hell Is the promise The world has for me. They don't know me or my pain In not having enough like me to relate to; seeking Friends amidst the throng whose eyes look menacingly In fear of what I could or would do to them and all. No matter what I say or think or do, the vitriol Just can't end. I need one whom I can dare to call And relate. But even this meal that temporarily heals me will Be considered something I stole of a hardworking Man's back. Taking other people's stuff is the thing All imagine me doing; this house I worked to buy Must have been ripped of some miserable family guy. These fancy clothes must be the blue to a conman's sky! How else Could I have these, earned through hours and hours, Sacrificing family relationships, my health, my loves, Just to hit my targets of making in concrete new flowers? Nobody believes I tried to change the world my way 'Cos to the world, robbing to climb is the only way We the 1% make a living. (c) nyonglema If you earn > $ 800 000/year, then you're part of this chastised minority: enjoy.
Weak Men
"Touch your feelings. Cry. Show that emotion." I remember one who did that as the plot thickened. Speaking of truth from his purple toga: Purple dripped to the floor because of his fear. An emotion. It crawled off hanging flesh on a back. It trickled off the whip, splattered on stone. He feared losing his position in the hierarchy. He feared being labelled a tyrant. He feared being labelled too clement. Truth knocked at his door, offering Salvation. He chose his weakest emotion as guiding star, And led Barabbas to lonely babies and future orphans. Standing there, drowning in fear, fear, fear, Beset by crystal balls drawing his fate In paths to future outcomes in purple blood On the city walls, amidst the clamour, his Gumption Was vaulting over a bowl of ostrich water, washing Off the blood saying, "It wasn't me! Fac sicut vultis" Where was the Evangelist, to write the guilt, Shame and justified tears, as the eclipse shook The temple to its foundations, stole the light Off the world? To watch him watching Him on His Mission, Shedding the tears of repentant strong men, but Only, this time regretting "what if", "what if". (c) nyonglema
My son is 10
Only yesterday you put your fingers in my eyes As if to dot them, to make them more perfect for you. Today, you cross my Ts and with ink, dot my i's For our conversations have got richer with each day And as I recall cradling you to sleep with many tries For you would stare, looking for everything new In the living room, where you and I crawled like spies, Discovering every nook, every cranny, every day, I relish you now, on your way to start your own fires, On your way to be the spirit that brings out something new, On your way to reach mine, then peak at a higher spire On your way to change the world, your way. (c) nyonglema
waghni 