I am unlovable.
Easily broken
like the glass that shattered
long before I even touched it.
I am war-
too volatile to handle,
too unpredictable to wait for
so I told you to run,
take nothing with you
(except for regret)
for it will only slow you down
and I don’t have time to warn you twice.

Why would you choose to stay?

Years later
I’m still sitting in my aloneness
in a home built out of paper mache and sweat
anger and hate weighing comfortably in my aching belly-
I am only vengeful towards my body,
and it knows that.

I spit fires from my tongue,
setting borders alight
because unbounded
is the only way that I’ll have you Love-

You know just how it is that I like my coffee.

Bloodied walls
and broken hands,
I’ve been building this staircase for a while now.

…I’m just looking to ask god why…

You asked me if I was ready
and I told you that my pain wasn't done baking yet
I am still dancing with the shadows of my demons-
I am open wounds that refuse to heal.

I want to feel your breath on my skin
but I am afraid of how it deeply it will scar
because every time you touch me,
I bleed.

My lungs started collecting dust
on a shelf somewhere:-
collapsed from the heaviness of mistrust
and almost apologies-
Yes, my mother did warn me about men
that creep in and out women’s chests at night.

So go on and make a home out of her,
I’m no use to you like this.
I am bloodshed.
I am war.
Too volatile too handle,
and too unpredictable to wait for.
My pain isn’t done baking yet,
but I will wait by the waters until it does.

I am alright in my own solitude…

I’ll make poetry out it.


By: Lulwama Kuto Mulalu

these fingers don’t seem big enough
to catch all your losses
and my pockets are filled to the brim with shame
so forgive me when I say that
i can’t love you right now
because I put my happiness in a bottle
marked
“for emergencies only”

it seems that
in the midst of all the chaos
i misplaced my faith again
in the juxtaposition of your embrace
and my inability to heal
so i hailed a cab for you
because it me killed more to
watch you stay suffering
in this fragmented
and disillusioned
version of reality

years from now
i’ll still be constructing a self
that is less destructive than this
within the boundaries
of crumbling walls
and absent apologies
that keep the pain flowing in

the reason that I stopped
looking for your blue dress
in the blur of blank spaces
is because
i broke my kaleidoscope long ago
searching for the better version of me
that could convince you to
come back home
once more

since then
my heart has known only
the indifference of your presence
because I stopped calling out for you
in crowded streets filled broken souls
such as myself
poor people digging for meaning
and rainbows
in colourless conversations
trying to please an insatiable hunger
forgetting that our bellies
are already swollen
with disappointment and anger

By: Lulwama Kuto Mulalu

Twelve O’clock;
two hands
frozen.

And how time did stand still
–so still.
To allow us
to live
more,
to linger
just a little bit longer
in a kiss-
born from so lustful a longing,
it simply made the world
stop
for a while.

And in those non seconds
of sheer silence
I finally caught my breath
again,
and again,
and again,
and again.

By: Lulwama Kuto Mulalu

I saw the dam wall struggle
underneath all the weight
of the water
we said to have been
"under the bridge”-

Still,
I thought that the floods
would not have arrived so soon
in the early days
of summer:

all those fostered feelings of
worthlessness,
and anger
came rushing back,
like pent up pressure
in too small a space,
pushing hard
against
the crumbling walls
of my current state
of unhappy,

              entropy maybe?

I don’t know.

By: Lulwama Kuto Mulalu

Yes-
You walked into this
knowing that
you would get burned.

But still you touched
with already blistered,
and charcoaled hands
because
once
is never enough
for children to truly comprehend
the lessons
their mothers taught
them

Don’t play with fire sweetheart
for your heart will turn into
ash
once
her
ambers
go out.

You choked on the heat
of your desires
after they went up in flames,
setting your insides ablaze
and of course
with help always arriving
a second too late-
who could
save you
from the firestorm
that had just
erupted
in the shallows
of
your mind?

So don’t play with fire sweetheart,
because you will get burned.

The smoke will
char your lungs,
leaving
you panicked
for release.

And lust will do that-

It will
set alight
everything it touches
destroying
anything unwanted,
that even dares
to stand in its way.

Arson is a crime.


By: Lulwama Kuto Mulalu

I want to leave a map of
Butterfly Kisses on your chest:-

I will delicately press my lips against your tender skin
And trace an intricate pathway of gentle poetry from
the very tips of your hair,
to the bottoms of your feet;
I want to make sure that
whenever your smile wanders off somewhere into the night,
it can always
re-trace its footsteps back home…
to me

I want to leave a map of
Butterfly Kisses on your chest:-

Itty bitty breadcrumb words and metaphors
To remind your next lover
(as a precaution)
Just how it is that you like your coffee.

I want to place the alphabet in your mouth
So that every time you kiss her-
You can tell her your story.

I will hide little poems
In the crevices of your mind
And anecdotes between
the hallowed out spaces on your spine
for you to remember
me
when you walk out the door
for the last time.

By: Lulwama Kuto Mulalu

I am scared to let myself feel vulnerable for you:

See,
My heart’s been tortured by your kind before-
So I lay bricks of mistrust and hurt around it
Because even once-
Is one too many times for me
To feel so very deeply,
The unrequited touches on my frayed skin.

They say that drowning is the worst way to die,
But what if I willingly dive into the sea of blue
that is your eyes…

Would that still count as suicide?

Do you ever think of me,
Half as many times as I do you?
Because I often wonder:

Are we still friends in the dark,
Or do you also hear the loudness of my heartbeat
reverberating through my chest-
For you?

By: Lulwama K. Mulalu (.15)

Sometimes I think that love toys with me because she knows just how easy it is to break me. If I could sing of all the ways in which she got me wrong, or fumbled on her timing, god ****** my vocal chords would rip themselves out- because I sure wouldn't have the strength to. I surrender; I am waving the white flag because I am defeated by her lack of empathy. Why does she give only to take? Is it because my child-like-heart still refuses to learn from the many mistakes that I've made?

But...

Innocence doesn't know any better than to look for comfort and warmth in open spaces, doesn't bother to use a compass to find out where exactly it's running to, or even understand that not everybody who holds my hand is worth bleeding out for.

The other day love came through my doors unannounced: she was livid and shouting obscenities, demanding me to tell her what exactly it was that I wanted from her. What.did.I.want. from.her? The audacity-

Dear love,

Where were you when the entire house of cards that we built and called home, came crashing down? You know, I still haven't managed to pick out the small pieces of your betrayal from the hallowed out spaces between my bruised ribs. As it turns out, you actually can't fashion a future out of tattered faith and recycled paper just like you said.

YOU'RE A SUFFOCATOR: my lungs are burned and black because I'm still breathing in smoke from the previous fires that you started. How dare you leave my mouth parched, constantly thirsty for something sweeter than your bitter endings! That is not fair. I found out years too late that blind trust is really not the same as following you, mind shut, into the dark. (And just to let you know, you actually never did explain the difference between "white lies" and "half truths" right.)

I'm exhausted. But I guess constantly having to search for meaning in empty conversations will do that to a person. I followed your voice here because I thought that that was what you wanted me to do. Well, wasn't it?...

If you stop singing the blues for me,  I promise I'll stop blaming you for my river of tears. When I was younger my father taught me that "pain only builds character", and so I will take all **** that you've put me through and paint it a nice gold. To be fair, I must commend you for a valuable lesson I've learnt:
******* do come packaged quite nicely don't you think?

P.S I would really like my running shoes back.

Yours,

I had to strip you bare
Of all your convictions
Because you had no choice
But to wear the weight of the world
On your broken back

I watched as you cried
Rivers upon rivers in the desert
Because life had given you no choice
But to save your dying garden
With the only water that you had left

The heaviness of standing up straight
Became too much for your swollen feet;
So instead:

You stand limply with a spine crooked
From the many dry days you spend,
back curled over,
And head hanging towards the earth-simply praying for the rain

I heard them whisper the stories
About the screams they ignored
That came from other side of the door
Of the house you grew up in:

So tell me,
was it your husband or your father
That frightened you more?
(Because they never said...)

Your mother always told you that
Roses could never bloom in the desert-
But you ploughed in dusty soils anyway,
Hoping that love would grow on the pain
The rains had not washed away yet

It seems that the sun had willed itself
To burn down everything that you owned-
So with calloused and cracked hands
You dug deeper into the ground
In search of anything to put the fires out

I heard you lamenting for rain
In that dischorded voice of yours;
But no matter how many tears you wept
Or however many prayers that you sent,
They were just never enough
To make flowers bud in the desert.

By: Lulwama K. Mulalu

China doll with a porcelain white face,
How your smile is soft but fading.
Your eyes little doll, are dark and hollowed;
They speak only of a soul waning.

China doll with such dainty, fragile hands,
Why is it you stand so limply with a broken back?
I found you in the dark with hands tightly chained,
Is that how they became so bruised and so black?

China doll in your lovely yellow dress,
Your mouth was sewn shut by your owner:
She with her invisible strings became your master;
And you in your silence, her prisoner

How impeccably imperfect you are-
Your creator left a crack upon your face:

Of all the dolls she put on display,
You, China, are her special make.

Paint the world with words and the world will become your canvas.

By: Lulwama K. 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

An origamist took my heart,
folded it into a thousand pieces
and then called it art.

By: Lulwama Kuto Mulalu

Dear Heart,

I know that you are tired, because I am tired too.
I know that you are fragile and hurting,
-I can feel the hopelessness in your fading beats.
I tried my utmost best to take care of you in the little ways that I knew how
But still, you are slowly bleeding out

-I failed… I failed you.

One day in the future I will get the courage to ask you for that undeserved forgiveness,
The forgiveness that I cannot seem to even give to my body,
And I hope that on the day, I will be able to beg you for that same pardon with the humblest of hands.
I pray that when you see the scars on my swollen knuckles, you will not despise me,
Instead you will look at me with pity filled eyes
And tell me that my sickness, this awful sickness, was never my fault.
I know that you are scared, because I am scared too.
But mostly I am scared for you,
For I am not getting better am I?

Dear Heart,

I am so sorry for letting you down,
For treating you in the most indecent of manners,
For all the permanent bruises that I have given  you
…And for the damage, and what unspeakable damage I have done unto you…
 I am monster.
I know…I know that you are exhausted,
But I don’t know how to ask for the help that you need.
I have forgotten how to speak truthfully and honestly about how much it hurts
How do I tell them what I have done to you?
You deserve better.
But I am not the better that you deserve
I am the ****** luck that you got stick with
And for that I sincerely apologize.
You deserved much better.

Dear Heart,

I cannot promise to help you
Because deep inside of me I know that I don’t have the strength to.
I cannot save you,
And for that I am sorry.
The truth is that I have forgotten how to be free.
I don’t know how to any more.
I somehow un-learnt how to keep in what I take in
But no matter how many times I purge my sins and ask myself for redemption,
The little morcels of guilt always seem to remain in the very centre of my gut.

Dear Heart, 

This punishment was never aimed at you,
But you deteriorated and withered from it none the less…
You should have been treated with more respect
With love and care…
Please grant me your resolve
And give me the serenity to accept all my imperfections
Please tell me that you forgive me.
We are a broken pair, both you and I
-You we were never meant to suffer
But you did
And you are still.
Never forget that you are precious to me,
It was never my intention to hurt you in the torturous ways that I did…
Your pain was an unfortunate side-effect of my selfish inability to be free
And for that I apologize,
I apologize for the unbearable inconveniences that you have been forced to face
Please find it within you to forgive the mess of host that I have become…

                                                                                                                Yours sincerely,   

By: Lulwama Kuto Mulalu

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

Dear soldier,
Though my heart is a warrior
It’s been broken one too many times
By the broken people who tried their very best to fix it
I am a lonely traveller looking for a home
A home for the leftovers
For those that were left over during the long walk for freedom
But freedom is a hard fruit to come by
Especially for those seeking salvation
A new foundation
To lay their fallen bricks anew and start over again

I’ve heard that silence is concession.
Though I guess that the other day when we kissed in silence
I must have miscommunicated my affection towards you
Maybe I will wait for you there by the riverside then?
Where the air tastes sweeter than the fruit life bears
Maybe there both of our heads will get dipped in the purest of waters;
And maybe then will we be saved
Maybe the Baptists can convince you to take off the pain you wear so well-
How it hangs so loosely on your fading shoulders.
You used to be so big and strong
But you are getting so thin now my love
I asked you to eat
But you told me that freedom was only for the forgiven
And that?
That was a hard fruit to swallow

I wrote you a letter the other day
Written in an ink so peculiar a shade of red-
The richest of reds, though only fit for a soldier such as you
I came home from the forbidden forest with a basket filled with a variety of fruits:
Love
Freedom
Happiness
And most importantly forgiveness
I offered you the entire basket for it was a basket for the hurt
One for Soldiers such as yourself
I begged you to eat because it was too painful to watch you whither
But you looked up at me with those heavy- same-tired eyes
And told me that you were leaving.
I guess the fruit I bore wasn’t ripe enough to be consumed by sinners yet.

Like a caged bird sings a song of sorrow,
I too shall sing many lamentations in your honour
I will tell the people that you were braver than most,
Even though I felt your fears when our hands touched
I will tell them that their father was a fighter
A soldier is what I will tell them
And when they ask me where you are at the dinner table
I will tell them to wait patiently by the riverside for their Father
Because I know that freedom is a hard fruit to come by
Especially for worn down souls such as yourself.


By: Lulwama Kuto Mulalu