Tag Archives: God

joy

Looking for Rafiki #rise

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There are times that life gets so complicated that you lose hope, that you believe that you are just a mistake in God’s master-plan. In those moments, you may wish to be in a movie.

Like in the Lion King, where all goes bad, then here comes Rafiki with the water reflection trick to make you see yourself, you wish for that epiphany. Then you say to yourself it will never happen…well maybe here it is 😉




My soul is longing for peace,
My mind is working on the fleece of the wool of redemption.
Dad always said the only solution to anything was preemption,
But …that’s not helping now, I need magic beans, or even peas.

I’ve scraped my knees
Against the floor, bruised my thighs like a failed sliding tackle
And broken my fingers with nothing to show but my lost battles
Hanging like trophies in a hive deserted of bees.

I’ve seen life seethe,
And stink to the brim with no solace, direction or intention,
Smelt the reek as if each of my steps would take me up the proverbial creek
Yet my Sisyphus reward is to walk still and breathe

Yet you Lord look me
Deep within the soul at that time I dare not look at a mirror
And see more than gold where I sense but ghouls and cheap horror
But dare not call for help ashamed and cuddling my defeat.

You see the meat,
Where I see only decay clinging to bones as the flies tug,
Cheese where I see but milk going away as the flies would tug
And You call to me, and call again while I pull up my bed sheets.

Totally hid I feel,
Yet You still see, still call, still love, still long
For that seed you sowed to bask in the raining glow of the sun
And dance to the tune of photosynthesis and mitosis and start to reel

Totally dead I feel,
For undeserving, I am served with the most beautiful voice
Of hope from a fellow human sent by You, I push away the buoys
You send because this despair loves this creek stroking the keel.

But you Lord look me,
And beckon louder, and louder, and louder, each bellow more potent
Than the previous, and like trees swaying by the wind bent
I feel the soul you gave me reach for the rudder, but me

I love this creek,
So I pull it away. But you beckon even louder and louder and louder,
And maybe that’s when I hear the prayer my soul’s slowly powdered
On my days in the silence of my subconscious, courageous and meek

I love this creek,
Lord, but it hurts to be this deep. I’m accepting what I can’t change
Just like you advised. Don’t pull me out, I don’t deserve any chance.
That’s my conscious rationalising. But I sense my soul’s subtle leaks.

The transcripts are in,
It calls to its Maker in hidden text, and writes lengthy memos,
I’d not read. I’m starting to hate this creek through its demos.
Maybe it’s time to leave. But will you Lord take me back in?

You Lord look me
Deep within, beyond my saddest moments, beyond my soul’s hardest
Torments, beyond the times I pushed you away trusting my breast
Alone, you Lord choose me again, You really choose me

And call on me,
To cast my burdens, to cast the yoke I have piled on my shoulder
And leave the creek wherein I’ve been rolling up the evil boulder,
To come home: your love gives me hope, your love heals.

(c) Nyonglema

joy

Working for the white man #noRacism #coloursNsmells

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This is what I learnt from working for the white man:

  The rainy season will come each year, and so will the dry
  And bosses can be mean, they can be sad, they can be shy
  And life will move on even when the targets seem high
  And the team will be there, to scoff but sometimes say fie
  But they can lift you high with a good laugh, or just smile.
  I learnt to be humble in front of challenges, for God
  Put them there to shine through the successes we got.

Then,

This is what I learnt from working for the black man:

  The rainy season will come each year, and so will the dry
  And bosses can be mean, they can be sad, they can be shy
  And life will move on even when the targets seem high
  And the team will be there, to scoff but sometimes say fie
  But they can lift you high with a good laugh, or just smile.
  I learnt to be humble in front of challenges, for God
Put them there to shine through the successes we got.

And,

This is what I learnt from your puzzled mind:

We’re all the same deep under, and the colour doesn’t determine
  What success or failure or iniquity or sanctity you bring.
Black, white, dark, spiked, light, night, yellow, mellow,
  I’m looking at you looking at me, but we’re all one big shadow
On this sphere spinning in nothingness. That colours, smells
  Are just ways to make the labrador hate hounds and spaniels.

I learnt to be humble in front of challenges, for God
Put them there to shine through as we merge into one pod.

(c) Nyonglema

sadness

Downhill #despair #darknessIt

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It all goes downhill from here.
At home, I’m not the man I paint
On the wall of my dreams. I’m not he.
My kids see me, but I see a faint
Depiction of myself, riddled with fleas
I see a demon with horns in their saint
Advising, holding, downhill to hell.

It all goes downhill from here
When even at work your effect is faint
And your figures are wrong, targets wrong
And failure’s the only thing you acquaint
As the reports are filed and you’re wrong wrong.
Where did you go wrong in all that you meant
To achieve as you go downhill to hell?

It all goes downhill from where
Suicide lurks in the scripts on the page,
Taunts you with methods, means to fix this.
Gives you the manual to soothe and assuage,
In detailed depictions with diagrams and digits,
To stop decay and just leave it all without rage
Down down down down downhill to hell.

It all goes downhill from here.
Even the staff is broken, staring with rage
As you disgust in the reek of your failure.
The promises filled the meter, but didn’t meet the gauge
And your futile attempts to fix are lures
To aggravate the stench and meet Murphy’s adage:
“It will go downhill downhill to hell.”

 

What’s left? What’s left? What’s left?
Nothing. Nothing. Downhill downhill …to hell.

 

But it need not go downhill from here.
Your finger’s on the trigger of solace, or so you think.
There’s a Saviour in true panoramic review
Of the situation. He resets the stroboscope on your blinks
So you can see the brightness now out of view.
It’s never easy when the dishes seem to overfill the sink
But it always goes down down and away from hell.

For it only seem to go downhill from here
Because pain injects despair and shortsightedness within
And Hope’s disguised as sci-fi anime.
But if you look deeper, that veil will wear out very thin
And within God whispers each step of the way:
“It’ll be OK. Let me take you off the sand for a spin”
And your “Yes” will take you up up and away to well.

(c) Nyonglema

love

On Marriage #writing201 #pontifex #pope @b_arco

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“Immediate interests” on poetweet.com
Compiled from tweets by Pope Francis @pontifex
Compiled and edited by Nyonglema

Know that they are loved and saved.
And are saved who loved!
Presence, before the Tabernacle.
Beauty of loving and being loved.
We can overcome every obstacle.

Makes us always able to forgive!
Always forgive the able
No visits to their aging grandparents.
Deep joy which only God can give.
God and celebrating the sacraments.

Efforts and creates great things.
See here all things great
In lives of Christian spouses.
The equal dignity of human beings.
To accept and carry our crosses
Our struggles and our sufferings.

(c) Nyonglema

joy

Where is my Map? #writing201 #lost #stray #pindaric #ode

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You light the way that leads to my life,
Love on the cross shines down on my strife,
Saviour, my Lord, save me today,
Show me the way, Lord take my hand

I saw the stars the dark ones oh Lord,
And lost my sight, and followed the hoard,
Deep in I went, yes sought out the void,
‘Twas so devoid of Love in this land

Draw me nearer, Master nearer,
Draw a way to save what’s left today
Draw me nearer, Master hear us,
Listen and save your children as humble we pray.

(c) Nyonglema

joy

For me? #life #breath #thanksLord

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Lily fragrance dances about my nose like lasses in a mall,
I soak it all in: bees and butterflies want nectar like I muesli.
Flying about like happy tweets, the birds colour the sky with cheer and fluff
Enjoying the blue sky, like I the breeze; did You make all this just for me?


Nyonglema

joy

The answer to Life #whyAmIHere #theBigQuestion

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The beauty of being alive, to me it was belied,
Is to indulge in each minute knowing someday I’ll die!
This macabre thought walking with me through strife
And through joys made both seem shamefully alike.

The long face came a long way to mar
Each minute – that long face I pulled.
I’d curse and hurt, wishing for a better star
And miss each occasion to smile in a better style.

And if 50 was right about happiness and pain?
Then I think grandma’s passing is fully explained;
The tears poured on the grave to water the grain
Of happy memories saying “Would you were here again!”

And if Nas was right about life how you make it?
Then that thought’s had me wearing mine down to naked;
Chasing the wind surely never wrote Ecclesiasticus,
It was purpose pushed Sirach to inscribe “All’s vanity”.

Yes! Purpose, the diamond in the rough,
The needle in the hay, like finding on earth divine love:
All I learnt to seek like wading in a mangrove
Looking for gold. I have my sieve ready to go!

So why should I think death as time rolls,
And live death, even before my Holy Lord?
As I kneel down, conscious of my Purpose or God,
I’m thinking: “Why bother, when Your Will will be done?”

(c) Nyonglema

joy

Existence #alive #lifeIsGood

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A heave of my breast and the crawling in of air,
That stealthy walk of air on each piece of skin
As the wind blows, and I see beauty with this pair,
Tell me I exist, but does the manikin?

Rugged surfaces my fingers would play across,
And rustle the leaves lying lazy on the grass;
Maybe that’s the difference! And that I can feel loss
when a peer surpasses Time’s hourglass.

Surely the manikin knows nor pain nor joy,
And love is but letters on silken embroidery.
And that manikin can’t choose to hate corduroy,
And less choose to indulge in day time reverie,

And the fragrance of the flowers or Boss perfumes
Stealing a smile from my face at this instant.
Surely the manikin can’t enjoy the jolly tunes
Of the choir or the visual excitement of a playing infant?

(c) Nyonglema

joy

The Chosen Father #Joseph #Christmas

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Oh Bethlehem of glorious fate,
You through love became so great,
For within your walls in lowly plate
Joe’s heir laid down His Godly state.

The gusty winter blew in the cold
As wife and Son in his cosy hold
Sought the heat cold morn denied
As if the manger’s shame to deride.

Loud clouds told the shepherds how
From Heaven to cradle God did bow,
And jump and run with sheep did they
To see the Saviour curled in hay.

In wisdom, three the star did see
And off to worship the Lord went they
To Herod, then to stable where
Joseph received gifts and wisdom rare.

And in that darkness shone that Light,
Of the world from that lowly site.
And Joseph, Mary, Jesus slept
In peace while God their spirits kept.

(c) Nyonglema

joy

The Desert I Sought

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One step on the white blistering sand,
Sandals in hand, turban shrouding my beard
From the gusts of arid wind sucking my sweat
And burning my skin and mucosa.

I looked ahead, raising my hand
To block the sun and see the herd
Of camels ahead, and beyond the dunes,
The promise of death from thirst and hunger.

I saw the cactus hold firm to the sand,
And scavengers in the form of an innocent bird
Swimming overhead as if to admire their work:
Meatless bones basking lifeless in the sun.

Was that my fate? Lifeless in the sand
Going through the process to be bird turd
As they pecked and relished? So it seemed.
I pulled myself on, and my body protested.

Is this why this route was so bland?
That civilisation despite its million nerds
Had not found a way to profane the dunes
And  enforce its will on Nature’s plans?

But I keep on with the target at hand.
Oh…I forgot to give you the Word!
Great promise lies ahead, beyond the pain,
Beyond the thirst, beyond lurking death.

Behind me lies a devastated land,
The old me: wicked an absurd.
Beyond the pain lies Life, and just like a newborn,
I shall bear the suffering that takes me Home.

(c) Nyonglema