"When the Face you Detest is You"

"When the Face you Detest is You"

It is easy to stare in the face of sinners

with holy anger streaming from your face,

Smirking gleefully at their foulness,

And priding in your self-bequeathed sacredness.

Because your robes are white,

And your titles high

But, hey, what of your heart?

You leap on every wrong turn,

Crying the law and its damning consequences,

Hell-bent to uphold a law you never held.

Like whips, your pious smile

Scourge their errant souls.

From your fiery sermons, two faced-sword

Proceeds to slash these damned hearts

Beyond the reach of your high-handed salvation.

Every Sunday, you wear your scarlet gown

With a wig hanging loosely on your head,

And a blood dripping gavel in hand,

And then sit infallibly on men' sins

And dispatch them to the hands of cruel Justice

Forgetting you're dust too.

Then suddenly, the pendulum of truth

Swings to this other side,

And you are standing before your foil

The breeze of heaven blows on you phoney soul

Leaving you bare and bereft of your holy fig leaves.

And you stand before His mirror,

Loathing the sight you see

A poor sinner like every other soul.

"Bound For the City"

"Bound for the City"

Growing up in this small village

Felt like a ghost watching his body being interned unceremoniously

I was detached from everything else that had a taste of joy.

Like a stranger, I kept on wandering far away

From the land, from the people, from their dwarfed dreams and shallow fears. 

My soul was like a raptured explorer,

distant lands held peace and hope for me

Far away from the gloom and unanswered questions

That plagued my restless mind,

Spurring up this journey that is set on my feet.

Still, I will take the love of the loved ones along

And the remaining pieces of my cherished rags,

Such precious remains shouldn't be tossed away so easily.

Because its presence breathes the past that I have sworn to part with.

The city they say is a wild,

To survive you must roar and fight off

Other predators like your poor soul,

But at the retreating steps of the day,

You are sure to return home

with a reward as much as your sweat.

Yet my soul is bound for this world,

Far away from the tiny spot under the table of crumbs,

To a world where dreams grow wings like the eagle,

And dare heights unheard of in the sky.

"Conversation with an atheist Lover"

"Conversation with an atheist Lover"

Last night 

before sleep stole the light in your eyes

We talked about making babies in the clouds

And call them angels

And they will be so fine 

That God will be jealous of our Kind.

We laughed out loud

It echoed in heaven

And I heard God sigh

It was deep and throaty

And we wondered why God is always a man.

He could have been a woman 

That sings duduke like Simi

Then we wouldn't bother the angelic choir

"They will just come and dance shaku shaku with us," you said.

You said God can never be a woman.

He is a man!

Maybe that's why he keeps quiet

When men steals into a woman's body like wolves

And run off smelling blood and greed.

I sighed now but more deeper and throaty than God.

I wanted to say I doubted.

I wasn't too sure.

So I kept quiet.

I wondered why such evil lie in man.

Most men?

You said no 

That some are beast and God enjoys watching them feast.

I thought I knew God,

At least better than this,

I really thought I did,

I still do, I think?

What should I even think?

It is evil to think, right?

You told me to keep quiet now 

And write you a poem later

I suggested a happy-ever-after ending

You chuckled, and asked whether there's happiness after?

I said at least the joy of leaving here after is happiness.

You said Good

"Now you know how to think"

"Thinking is outside God"

I asked you how should I think?

You said, "write me a poem."

*********

I woke up minutes later.

I quickly wrote you a poem,

And hopes it finds you there

Where nothing with a deep throaty voice exists.

"Falling"

"Falling"

Keith walks with mirth in his eyes

Like a child that just got a new toy

His feet were quite unstable

Wobbling like he gonna fall.

Has he not fallen already?

Why bother rising?

He stood against love all his youth.

Its presence at home was a sham

"It was only a shadow."

He concluded:

"Since it wasn't at home, 

It couldn't be found elsewhere."

But he met defeat today

Staring into the warm glow of her eyes

He fell like a faint feather

He could grudge or muster a whimper

His heart was finally freed for his prison.

He finds himself in a new world

He isn't so sure how to walk

But he is happy he got something to lean on

If he falls 

Someone that won't let him fall

Like a mother to her toddler learning to walk.

"Somewhere Over Here"

"Somewhere Over Here"

I know a couple,
They have a home in a small room
At the extreme right-hand corner of a compound with adjacent rooms.
Their faces reveal a desire for a better life
A comfortable haven far away from the remoteness of poverty and hunger.
Their lips barely uttered a word
They communicated languidly with cold nods and weak gestures.

They are what you would call an unfortunate family in Africa.
Their hopes as citizens were stolen that morning when the mutilated election results were announced on air
Which was greeted with despair and disenchantment
They know it will be another quadruple years of scorching promises and penury.

This couple have a family:
Two worn-out adults and two kids yoked with constant infant illness.
I know this couple.
They are my parents.
I am their sick child.
We might die tomorrow.
Come and save us.

"The Return"

"The Return"(in the memory of Chukwuemeka Akachi)

My last rememberance of you 

Was that night we held hands

And you let mine slip away

You walked far away back into the night

That you let it darkness envelope us

Or was it just me that was lost in this madness that cocoons us in mid-day.

I could hear the castles we built in the air fall apart; this little mansion that fits us so well, where love mends our broken whole.

Your absence roars at my weak self

I crouch and die gradually in silence

I wish I could cry

But no one will hear me.

They're use to my pain; they no longer bother.

Each morning wakes up with its own sadness

Each night falls with its own tears.

Every yawn is a yearning for you

Every mourn is dirge for you.

I look helplessly at the door you banged

On your way out. 

Hoping you walk back this way again 

or I die a prisoner of your return forever.

    

"The Cycle"

"The Cycle"

You don't know how it feels

To be stabbed the second time,

the third time, the fourth time...

You won't feel anything again.

You would only learn the habit 

Of seeing yourself flow out of you in red fluids like a broken pipe.

You despise the morning for bringing the thought of living

You wish for the nights for it bears the alluring face of death. 

"I am a fool again," you exclaim,

"To give you my broken pieces."

"I thought you are a heart

smith.

But you still cut my debris again."

"To live, is to hurt or be hurt."

"Either ways someone bleeds."

You swore to yourself the umpteenth time

To be in the league of the former.

But your tender brokenness

Gives you away again

You walk back that same way 

You had your first cut

And then many others and this.