Category Archives: joy

Cheerfulness (Amusement, bliss, cheerfulness, gaiety, glee, jolliness, joviality, joy, delight, enjoyment, gladness, happiness, jubilation, elation, satisfaction, ecstasy, euphoria)

Zest (Enthusiasm, zeal, zest, excitement, thrill, exhilaration)

Contentment (Contentment, pleasure)

Pride (Pride, triumph)

Optimism (Eagerness, hope, optimism)

Enthrallment (Enthrallment, rapture)

Relief (Relief)

joy

Not today #Gore #Slavery #Wilberforce #Racism

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A Homo negus sits in a sardine can,
With many more like him, squashed together,
All in fetters, with 10kg dissuasion strapped
To them. He’s bound on a journey he hardly can
Comprehend, nor knows he where this pain goes
Despite avoiding capture before, while watching departure of many a brother:
He watched them go and never return to their homely coves.

A Homo negus sits in a sardine can,
Smothered by the stench of piss and soulful dirges,
Singing of shark food, once valiant men, women, sons, daughters.
These actually died, but all are bound to death in some living land
Where they’re less than dogs, they’re told, and everything goes.
Survivors of the murderous voyage are tools to quell carnal urges.
They’re no longer shackled in twos, but living in groups on life’s borders:
Whipped, weeping, weak, but forced to do exactly as they’re told.

A Homo negus gets pulled out of the sardine can,
Shackled in twos, they shuffle towards the waiting room
(A claustrophobe’s hell) each pressed against the other’s 3-month filth.
Through the narrow door the red sea screams with the blood of many a human
Who challenged this madness or got sick in these conditions.
He waits for the order to board the floating tomb.

But, he doesn’t know that today this trade will be killed;
That he shall go back home to heal, and heal a nation.

(c) Nyonglema

joy

After meals #kidsEnergy #Energiser

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When energy has been injected into the atom,
The electrons start jumping from level to level.
In the case of kids, that’s table to table,
And round the whole space, making mum
Wail inside with the noise, while dad cringes
Each time they miss a dangerous fall by inches.

(c) Nyonglema

joy

Sacrifice #Ebola #nurse #doctor #Liberia #SierraLeone

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Dedicated to the soldiers in the Ebola fight: all Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea nurses and doctors, and international volunteers. Below some names of soldiers alive or dead who’ve helped our humanity in no particular order:
Pauline Cafferkey, Abraham Borbor, Samuel Brisbane, Victor Willoughby, Diana Sarteh, Teresa Romero Ramos
__________________________________

The alarm growls “Wake up!” in song into her sleeping ears
As slowly she opens brown blood-shot eyes
To swipe upwards at the pulley menu on the buzzing screen
To dismiss the noise and jump out of warmth into ice
Cold morning brings to her bones with draughty jeers.

Off into the cold she drags her tired body.
Off to the hospital where she spends long days and nights,
Fighting death in guerrilla battles – some she’d win
Some would come back as knife-sharp nightmares and fright-
As she cared for the mildly sick and critically sick bodies.

“Today is special though” her fear-stricken heart surmises
As she walks in and switches apparel and goes working.
Today’s different: the heat in the astronaut gear;
The multiple scrubs; the care to take everywhere you’re walking;
The hope…no….prayer that your bit suffices to grow survivors;

Living the working day through a visor: Different.
This deadly virus vying for plague of the millennium
By bringing entire families to the pier of the Styx,
Fills the ward where she must administer care and calm delirium,
While calming her pulse enough that she would be efficient.

Can they hear her heart beat? Can they smell her fear?
Just a drop from the wrong spot on her exposed skin
And she’d join them here without the white armour,
Swinging on the balance of life from a kinked shoe string,
Unable to bring the love that brought her here.

Yes. She knows it might be over at any time:
Her ardour, her love, her care, her own piece
To the fight against the miniscule giant threat.
But she takes up her arms to fight the disease,
A soldier of love giving new hope to the living and the dying.

(c) Nyonglema

joy

Thoughts while on the plane #flying #plane #airport #aeroplane #takeOff #frequentFlyer

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– I –
Alu tube wings stretched on the ground,
Eyes turned outside to the turbine’s sound.
Then the dash,
And in a flash
We are happy birds casting disdain on the ground

– II –
Little littered specks amidst human nests
Without a rustle just lying on their breasts.
Each time I stare in wonder
Of what thoughts they ponder
These birds with human beings in their chests.

– III –
What’s that tremor? What does that light mean?
Why are we tilting? Why the sudden lean?
Why’s my heart with Vettel?
My palms a morning petal?
Love, hold me as we traverse this blue screen.

(c) Nyonglema

joy

Ebola #newDay #hope #faith #toTheFallen

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Spring’s back with no sun,
Baobabs stare at their dead leaves,
Watching for fresh shoots

(c) Nyonglema

joy

You Can #beChange #startChange #haveFaith #believe

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Change beckons to the souls of erring humans

Walking this abyss of lies and false promises,

Oblivious of the lives beside, of cheerful instants

They miss with eyes fixed on the AFCON premises.

 

She gestures grandly in frantic frenzy,

But the eyes stay fixed on the soccer game

Till from white the blood taints them red and bronzey,

Then it’s over, and we all start to complain:

 

“The weather’s not right, the traffic’s too tight,

Corruption’s rife while thieves play with our taxes,

The economy’s gonn’ nose-dive, relationships turn to strife,

And that report’s not right, and that’s some fallacious praxis!”

 

She gestures, then whispers, then shouts to all:

“One domino’s tumble can make millions to fall;

Take that one step like when you first stopped to crawl.

You can be and bring change. Even the sequoia started small.

 

So off your complaint hats and choose your battle

Carefully, and that one cause go champion cheerfully.

If each a battle picks and the status quo rattles,,

What wave of change we’ll all see here today!!”

 

(c) Nyonglema

joy

Family and Conflicts-Fey Fii-leu #family #mubako #nyonga #samba #sambaleko

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English:
A family without conflict
Is not a family.
But a family with conflicts, unwilling to resolve them
Is not a family either.

Mubako:
Fii a get fey sey ley
A fii gah
Fii a get fey le saa kut be sey ley
A fii ga koh

(c) Nyonglema

joy

Goodbye 2014, Welcome 2015

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As I drove past the crash yesterday- blue car upside down in a ravine-

I thought of the year dying, and how this driver must have driven

Off, considering that 2015 was his for the taking already!

So as 2014 takes a bow – a long bow-

I wish to all those blessed to breathe the air so close to the new year

Health, joy, love, hope, faith, trust, and true happiness.

 

May your New Year’s resolution be akin to a vow;

May you attempt all your dreams without a single fear;

May your actions leave lots for posterity like Arthur Guinness.

May the smiles you brought me adorn my face like a bow

Through 2015 as for the calendar I now tear

While relishing all the moments we shared I currently reminisce.

 

You all have been special to me in 2014,

My dear wife and mind boggling kids,

My family in its entirety, near and far.

My friends both new and old,

Those who read my work, those who liked and shared

Future readers, and all you bloggers.

Each one of you laid a stone to whom I am today,

And who I wish to be in 2015.

So, hoping to make it till 23:59,

And that you will be there with me to breathe the air God so graciously grants us

I wish you Happy New Year!

2015 is YOUR year….well mine too 😉

With love,

Nyonglema

My family

joy

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

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Two thousand years later, and we still long for the star
Of Bethlehem shining over our worn with work eyes.
And though love and joy and hope may seem far
Remember this season that: Love can thaw all ice,
That joy falls aplenty like a paddy of rice
That hope was born that day, but never it dies
If you share the love, joy and hope like He who brought that star.

To you and your families and loved ones, near or far,
(To the lonely take the joy to other lonely lives),
May He be born this Christmas  within your hearts and hearths
To guide and guard. Merry Christmas and Happy New Life next Year.

(c) Nyonglema

joy

Behind the Scenes #preparation #hardWork #hustle

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Did you ask him what he did behind the scenes?

The artist puts on an electric show;

The surgery’s done without sweat on the brow;

The painting looks sophisticatedly plain as what you could do;

The machines are fixed without much ado.

But did you ask what he did behind the scenes?

 

The melody’s perfect, but it’s just a piano;

The building’s perfect in 2 months, no more;

The plot of the story got you laughing for two;

And the bulb is on with a flick from you.

 

Did you ask her what she did behind the scenes?

The goal’s marvelous from a kick of a shoe;

The plane soars over the ocean with you;

The medal’s won by a long javelin throw;

And the target’s hit on the other side of the war.

Did you ask her what she did behind the scenes?

 

Did you ask them what they did behind the scenes,

As they learned the skills and honed them,

Sweat and pain and fear and bitter phlegm

Each time they failed, but dusting up to try again,

And loving each minute as they drew close to perfection:

That’s the iceberg lying behind the scenes.

 

(c) Nyonglema