— and from basement entries
neatly coiffed, middle aged gentlemen
with orderly moustaches and
well-brushed coats

We danced toward
each other's wounds

with gentle step
and touched inside

and now the bleeding
has resumed

and all this blood
is hard to hide.

156

You love me—you are sure—
I shall not fear mistake—
I shall not cheated wake—
Some grinning morn—
To find the Sunrise left—
And Orchards—unbereft—
And Dollie—gone!

I need not start—you’re sure—
That night will never be—
When frightened—home to Thee I run—
To find the windows dark—
And no more Dollie—mark—
Quite none?

Be sure you’re sure—you know—
I’ll bear it better now—
If you’ll just tell me so—
Than when—a little dull Balm grown—
Over this pain of mine—
You sting—again!

You shout and scream
Angrily saying words that you don’t mean
And in the heat of the moment
You’re only looking to burn everything that you see
Because you my love, are an Arsonist
  
You and I are tangled in a web of miscommunication
Whereby you speak a different kind of English-
A dialect where I hate you translates into I love you
And the bruises that you cover me with,
Are just secret poems that you leave on my skin

I don’t understand the poems though,
For they were poems written in an ancient alphabet;
A one that is undecipherable to the rest of the world-

Only because you are the misunderstood lover
That is speaking in tongues that no one has heard yet

So I laid there bare as you read them aloud to me
All broken souled and on your knees,
And I saw the shame in your famished figure
While you stuttered and recited your apology.

You always told me that you loved me through a broken telephone,
Why?
And made me promises that I knew could not be kept,
Why?
I heard you say that that time, was the last time…

But all that your words are are simply tongue twisters
In a perpetual game of Chinese whispers

By: Lulwama Kuto Mulalu

With a broken Hallelujah,
I sang you to sleep;
And at your wake,
Eulogized the many marathons
That you ran to find yourself,
Or scurried haphazardly,
After the self that you struggled to keep.

You know I waited for you,
Up on that mountain top?
While you searched tirelessly,
Almost desperately,
For that pin drop silence,
In the midst of all the cacophony.

By: Lulwama K. Mulalu