Light a fire upon the raging fire?
The wood shudders and writhes in pain
As fumes scoff at the deadly ire
Dancing about the dying twig, and it's plain:
Why add more fire to fire?
Seventy seven times seven is huge,
But sometimes barely sufficient to quell,
For forgiveness of the Scrooge
Is the silence of a storm-tossed city bell;
But this would cull the deluge:
(For the twig is now bent over,
Both sides seeking trust in combustibles,
The dance of shadows now groovier
Human life precious, now just expendable,
From a spark to a supernova)
That we had that mustard seed!
Barely perceptible, yet full of potential
Calling us eagerly to heed
The Master laying bare the essentials:
Grow faith, reach the mustard seed,
Hold the cycle of hate at bay!
With one act of kindness, a precious flower
Growing in the concrete today
Is the start of the end of destruction's power
Mustard seed. Mustard tree. Today.
(c) nyonglema
Tag Archives: hope
Going up
Higher he soars, the one who calls us to more Eyes stare, the clouds do pirouettes A silhouette against the advancing sky Some cry distraught at it happening again: What's to gain if the Master disappears? Memories of the first mass Bread broken, wine shared Hope poured out, on sandy stone On a hill gasping with bare bones Break oh break, hard heart of mine As our Lord leaves to another sublime clime. Oh wake, oh wake hard heart of mine The promises form out of the clay Of the fabric of time before me Hope covers my shivering body In quotes of all that He uncovered From our knowledge new discovered What wisdom we missed, Isaiah! For now, a silhouette against the advancing sky He goes before us as advocate: He lives. (c) nyonglema
What could have been?
What if the presidents cared? They said victory was imminent. With evil intent, with barrel on fatigue, Beads on mud-caked scentent string, Leaves so scared they're now silent, Trees hearing the slaughter of a pig, While life goes on in the battle ring. Few years back there was a mountain Where silicon budded genius software jigs. Yet eyes were closed on everything. Where were those billions you're now bent Over backwards to send over leagues To warring factions wearing hope thin? Yeah! What if the presidents cared? My people die for lack of wisdom. Life is nothing but an excuse to loot. Life is nothing but dirt to be trampled Upon when upside down is the kingdom, Wishing to have a neck under a boot As a solution to pain, Wishing that ample Resources can paint the soil crimson. Did you care when they dropped out? Did you bear those same veins on your temple When hunger ravaged the mother's bossom? Where were the millions to soothe And bring hope and make nimble? How many books did you garrison? How many teachers did you arm? How many laboratories have you loaded With new tech to break them out the prison? For cultures have marched out of harm By focusing on growth not the goading. So the victory still seems imminent, With evil intent, with barrel on fatigue The kids out of school, the schools on fire, Leaves so scared, they all went silent, Trees hearing the slaughters on the hills, While you fuel the hateful mire. (c) nyonglema
My ancestors hate me?
Bring me a white goat he said, your fortune is bad he said. Leaning on the shoulder of my uncle, my cells shiver Even as I hear they're hot from the thermometer, My pounding head lets the sound in from his chanting, And my burning nose hugs my sintering eyes. White lines zig zag and jiggle with his dancing skin, The hazy bones on the ground tell him everything. He knows everything, especially things I don't know. He speaks with my grand mother and grand father, And even people further into my genetic past. But my mind couldn't sit still: A white goat? To appease my Uwu, who taught me to pair my socks To avoid tornadoes in the room when I find just one? Would Doh really hate his son's son to the point Of wishing him dead before any stub on his chin? The calligraphy of incensed smoke fills my thoughts, Staring at his mouth calling my aunts and uncles Who seek a slab over my unbreathing head. Is this where dreams all come to die? Where the Maker warned we will be misled into cavorting with Evil? My uncle tells me this is ok, tradition suggests, no, DEMANDS, That in times of trouble, we should guess through bones Which of those who love us in reality, through the smoke Can be declared jealous, heinous, whether dead or here, So we can hate them, and thereby build up this lie as truth. (c) nyonglema
Do it for Love
"One day you'll fall in love" I heard the knife stab my ear drums For that word had wheels with sturdy spokes And rolled away from the bleeding guillotine With the hearts it had stolen, then broken. Romeo fell up the balcony while the bats Roamed the sky, catching the bugs in his Poetry. The melody cast a shadow at Juliet's Door and with his head over her heels, Her heart was gripped by the lyrics Pouring into the secrecy of that instant. The crickets sang the background, and Everything heaven seemed to hang in the air, The breeze waltzed her hair, her dress Throwing shimmers to enthralled Romeo: Never to part, they'll live the ever after ... Romeo's dead, then fall Juliet. Over and over the Poison and the Dagger Start as toddler Egos, wanting what they want And nothing else. Led by the fear of Being on an island, we seek to put the Other in a cage, and have them lark Out our favorite songs to the rising Sun, with pretty feathers, as pretty As the bars that we have offered them To look out through. Who wants to be alone? So Romeo dared choose the suicide of women, And Juliet that of men, each conquering fear of Their worst death to defeat their worst fear, For who wants to be alone? Maybe it wasn't love after all? Maybe the judges gavelling unknowing children To a future of multiple homes, fathers and mothers Or single homes, with guns drawn across the parapet Aren't breaking love, but something else? Maybe I shouldn't fear the word as I've been taught By decades of soap operas, movies, stories And by this dog-eared blue and read Oxford dictionary. Maybe we're all wrong to think when we own A person, we are doing it for Love? Maybe love is giving it all, and even more Till we have no more blood to pour? Maybe Love has given it all, and even more, So we know how to love our neighbour? (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
Gethsemane
As mere mortal man, where do I go for strength? Reels of death give me the L in a reek, like Lazarus died of covid19 in a past story of a tryke Tumbling into Jerusalem in tears with 2 sisters. "Pull Heaven to your breast", I hear that often, And belief is Atlas lifting Earth, Jupiter plus That weird new 9th planet, because Pluto was Not enough pain to bear: something newer, heavier Is what I need for strength, till I stop to think. Whom did God call to for help when fear gripped The roommate of flesh? How was the switch flipped? "Not Mine but Your will be done" Nothing heavier. (c) nyonglema
Arise #HappyEaster
Happy Easter to all my readers. We celebrate the greatest miracle of our existence, a symbol of hope as we witness one of the greatest tragedies of our generation. Pick up your heart, somebody needs it now, and also tomorrow...hope never dies. Rise from the squalor of the promise of death. Your wrongs hold you down like ladders fallen To the ground, broken, crying. The stone off your back rolls to the ground; Your shoulder speaks out-of-breath to your brain, And mixed with stress, the message is amplified. Let it roll to the ground, this is a new day. "Mother, behold, I make all things new". Mother torn trying to grip the wind on its Way to the mountains. How do you hold the wind? How do you hold fear? How much pain can one mortal vessel hold In drips of blood on stone, and gasps for Air on wood standing in stone? All things are new. Behold, the rainbow Shoots an arrow of renewal past the sunlit Perfumed clouds. It's all so beautiful that I forget the nails, the thorns. The rungs of This ladder lead to a new height. Rise from the parlor, and celebrate far away From family and friends. The electrons will Bring your elation all the way: It's resurrection time. Do this today; tomorrow we'll all be back to our Day to day. (c) nyonglema
Counting
They were not perfect squares, you know, those hard plastic Sticks of myriad colours that between my teeth like grit Sent weird signals of unevenness to my infant brain. If you take one green, then blue, red, then green again, Addition turns into 4 unicorns you can right with an equal sign. They aren't perfectly sinusoidal, those hard to bear curves On my screen, with lab coat, glasses, and eagerness to serve Me the death toll...like I should pay for a Wuhan virus. I love when up it goes, peaks, and down comes the sinus Like sunset announcing a new dawn or some equal sign. Some say stop counting the dead, for dread needs a father. So as I toss and turn, afraid the virus gets anymore fodder, I count my blessings, like the song taught me and my Siblings to do when you'd rather shiver, melt and die. Naming the inanimate heals they said, you'll be fine. So I'm counting oxygen molecules for free floating around, I'm counting a bed shared, the hugs and smiles, sound From little children goofing around, arguing about nothing. I'm counting parents, siblings, forgetting squabbles frothing, For life's a dainty petal dancing on sun-bathed silver lines Of air, scintillating in a million diamonds of green leaves Whistling a new tune of spring, dancing with the puffs above. The birds flap their garments of rainbow gliding on sheaves Out of the sky to brighten a smile I bear like finding love In powder and smoke. Darkness is where these blessings don't shine. (c) nyonglema
Coal #hope
Do not be discouraged. Don't lose your heart as everything seems to fall apart. A chick will emerge from the shell; always does. What do you see when the rough fire eats at wood, Softly sintering what was splintered? It's weird that pain brings togetherness Where handshakes were fake, and escape Was the constant. Now we crave to touch, We crave so much as the mask falls off To reveal the despair on the decaying Banana on the medic's lips. Last touch Gone. What I see is pain, but not like Cain's on Abel. I see the pain of a pierced side, or thorns Crowning the start of a battle for souls. I see the pressure of nails dodging wrist veins, But getting some, missing the bone, hanging on. I see years of preparation, patiently waiting For that moment: the filth of coal felt like Victory to the Virus smiling. The crown of the Start of the battle, rattled to the ground. Pressure, battle, the victor won without a sound. I see Sunday morning, Peter's out of breath Chasing John, chasing Mary earlier in the morn. I see a cloth there, bare, where coal had dared To start tears down my cheeks with biers. See, The wood destroyed slowly became the coal of pain, but What I see is not coal on worldometer's charts; I see diamonds form, Love's pressure on the Sacred Heart. (c) nyonglema
waghni 