You are here: Home / Archives for 2013

Archives for 2013

Sons of the invisible

“He is safe with us…” She stood there, anchored to earth by two concrete pillars of skin and blood. This hollow assurance meant nothing.

“Please, do like all the others have and just leave.” It took her decision mere seconds to become fully fledged, stripped of all doubt. “Give my boy back to me, right now! I’m not going anywhere!”

The haze of her tears obscured his response. The barrel arose, pointing up at her face. His mind fixated on one thought. “MY mother couldn’t get ME back…” This magnificent boy with his toy gun; and then his gun spoke…

The Whisperer

She had an affinity for the pronunciation of names. No matter the language or dialect, her tongue snapped around its intricacies and held fast, until names blossomed from her lips like butterflies escaping their cocoons. There was the croak of a sleepy frog in her susurrant “Mbembe”, the crack of a breaking bough in “Cormac”.

It was only her own name that flapped from her lips and fell, flaccid, to the floor. She did not speak it often in the village. She spoke her name so seldom that it was forgotten after some years.
She fashioned a new one through hints and nudges, never uttering it until its being was roughly fashioned through the tongues of others. They struggled, lips clawing over syllables, chipping them jaggedly until at once the name took off, exploded into the air like a spout of water. She caught it, and in her mouth the malleable sounds were softly smoothed into a gentle stream, a rush of water over cobbled stones.

She was The Whisperer.

Tomorrow

Tomorrow called my name aloud
Said it true and said it proud
Said it with the will of one
Who knows his duty done

Tomorrow called my name aloud
Hiding truth behind that bitter shroud
Knowing that the words he said
Would fill my ice-cold heart with dread

Tomorrow did his duty true
Brave and cold and knew
that life would never be the same again
once I knew of Tomorrow’s gain

Tomorrow trembled as he saw my eyes
Saw the fear and saw the wise
and knew I knew the message true
and what his words would bring me to

I saw Tomorrow regret the day
that he took a young girl’s hope away
I saw him weep and plead
For a young child’s hollow seed

The branch that would never grow
never simple blossoms know
Instead would lie in Forever’s hands,
Tomorrow’s and his ally,
Death.

Begging to die

The day breaks but it has no meaning,
We find no reason to live.
Hunger is unbearable but it already seems normal.
We live in shelter not suitable for humans.
Are we worth anything?
Do we mean something to anyone?
The world produces twice as much needed but we see no evidence of this.
Our Babies have no milk to drink and they die of hunger.
Watching our children’s hunger is worse than death itself.
Our leaders have abandoned us.
Humanity has abandoned us.
Where do we go?
What do we eat?
What do we do?
All we can do is cry for help but it falls on deaf ears.
There is nothing we can do but beg for death.
Life is not worth living.

Dearest Dorothy

Dearest, do you make flowers bloom in the days
And meet angels in the nights?

I heard beauty lives upon your face,
But not beauty of sufficient end…
Beauty of natural depth

They say, your mind too kind to exist with hate
Your eyes too bright to see the dark

But beloved, will you gaze upon your heart and find me there?
Will you gaze upon your mind and dream me there?

Upon these eyes, gaze awhile, dream awhile
For longer than awhile… my eyes will die

Call For Writers Deadline June 30, 2013 – Mother Earth International Literature Competition

$50 cash prize for gold winner. 3 prizes of publication in ArtAscent Art and Literature Journal including links to your website, promotion on ArtAscent website writer directory, and exposure in social media.

The competition theme is Mother Earth. The concept evokes visions of environmentalism, spirituality, wellness, cultural unity and responsibility. Who is Mother Earth to you? What needs to be expressed about Mother Earth?

Entries may include fiction, non-fiction, poetry, short stories and other written explorations (up to 500 words).

Submission deadline: June 30, 2013
Entries are $7
See www.artascent.com for submission details and to enter.

Kunta Kintes

The black man, dark and shinning,
shining so bright like a piece of
china ware.
The black man, dark in the body but plain in
the mind, yes! It is not black magic, but a
personal choice to be plain hearted, like
saint Peter and other saints.
For a black man can also be dark hearted
if he chooses.

Colour is not a barrier, because if you call
me a black monkey and I call you a white
pig, we will both be dark hearted. I the relation
of the slaves taken across the Atlantic , is now a
black president, it is not colour, so if you are a kunta kinte,
don’t call your brother a white maggot .
A real Kunta Kinte has forgotten the slavery encounter
,he has forgiven too, it is a world for humanity as one
,yes it is.Am proud to be a Kunta Kinte.

ERA OF selfinflicted CONFUSION

you CRITICIZE ME FOR I SPEAK NOT MY MOTHER TONGUE
you are the cause.

you ABHOR ME FOR I AM DIFFERENT TO YOU
you are not comfortable in your own skin.

you DO NOT SPEAK MY LANGUAGE
it is difficult for you to learn.

you HAVE MULTIPLE HOUSES ALL OVER THE WORLD BUT
you do not have a home

you TRAVEL ALL OVER THE WORLD YET
you have never been to you.

you BENEFITED FROM YOUR RIGHTS AND EVEN OTHER PEOPLE’S RIGHTS
you are still weak.

you SAY YOU LOVE YOUR FAMILY
you do not know what love is.

you HAVE A WIFE AND CHILDREN YET
you still frequent brothels and strip clubs.

you DEMAND RESPECT YET
you do not respect yourself.

you REFUSE TO LISTEN BUT
you want to be heard.

you SPEAK ABOUT THE LIGHT YET
your heart is as dark as the place you come from.

REDEEM YOURSELF FELLOW BEING TAKE A JOURNEY TO SELF.

Betrayal

All you have been is a waste.
You never once stood up for me.
Your existence was my failure,undoing, and punishment.
Just a damn tool for others plans of destruction or pleasure
A masterful escape route for uncontainable anger
Yet now again you will not stand for me?!

No I say to supple forms n mountain bossoms!
To softness shaded purple and blue
To guilt to shame to disgust
What are you? Failure!
I wish to return you, I wish you were not me.

Filth.

Wathintha abafazi, Wathintha imbokodo? Ha.
Every curve yelling out weakness.
Take it back! Take it all back!
Trade in bountiful backsides n tender lips, for broad backs n big hands.
I cannot be your victim.

Secrecy Bill

White paper burns, as hot as a flame
Just printing with censors, not the governments shame
The red in our flag, is it the colour of blood?
Of our human rights, flowing away like a flood?

Don’t hide away, let us see the corruption
The country must not go deeper, no economic suction
But as a united country, we must not yield
We must play the best with the cards we are dealed

So let’s turn our pages into pages of truth
With plain hard facts, understood without being a sleuth
Eliminate the cowardly cloud of secrecy that’s hovering,
We must protest and demand to see what they’re covering

We must know about bribery, corruption and dealings
Doesn’t it take away our expression and feelings?
This bill can prosecute a journalist or a whistleblower
For telling their secrets, could we sink any lower?

In these dark times, where is the light
Oblivious to what’s going on, how can we fight?

« Previous Page
Next Page »