THE RAT AND THE PREGNANT WOMAN


A story poem

BY

Alexander K Opicho
(Eldoret, Kenya;aopicho@yahoo.com)



Dedicated to;
My mother Neddy Nabisino Mayende Kuloba Makhakara
And her mother Maritini Nabengele Nasenya Mulemia Namugugu Ilungu wa Wenwa.
The story telling power of these two ladies is the primary source of my passion and love for humorous and peace bettling stories. I owe them all the recognitions.







OPENING SONG
How do I start telling this story that I got from my
Grandmothers when sited around the fire yard in the evening?
I don’t know how to start surely,
For to day I am very shy; all of your eyes
Are on me, looking at me like ocean of looking organs
But let me embolden my self with the belt
Of a story teller that my grand father gave me
And commanded me to preach peace
Through story telling in every place I go
So my spiritual service to humanity is telling stories
Is to soothe and heal wounds of humanity
By softly telling peaceful stories
Let me then cough to clear my voice and start;

Long time ago, but not very long time
Some where between the centuries of twelve hundred
And seventeen hundred after the death of the other Jewish
Story teller who died without a wife, who died on the cross
But others say he died on the stake, his name was Jesus,
There existed only two kingdoms in land which is known today
As Bukusu land found in the present east Africa or Indian Ocean coastal Africa,
The first occupants of this vast land is the sons and daughters of Babukusu
Or the ones who like selling ironsmith products
And hence the name the people of Bukusu; the people who sell,
The two kingdoms were the Kingdom of muntu and the kingdom of manani
The citizens in the kingdom of muntu were short men and short women
Handsome and beautiful, slender and not assertive in their physical disposition
But the citizens of the kingdom of manani were all cyclopic,
In their everything; the manner of walking, talking farting, micturating
Farming, breathing, snoring, smiling, singing, whispering
Their whisper was a noisy as the tropical thunderclap
They were tall men and tall women, very tall
Their young person was as short as the tallest
Person in the kingdom of muntu,
When one of the citizen of manani snores
All the citizens of Muntu along together with,
Their king Walumoli wa Muntu had no option
But remain awake throughout the night,
Because the cacophony of a snore from
The sleeping courts of Manani was not bearable,

On many occasions Walumoli wa Muntu
The conscientious king of the muntu kingdom
Had arranged to talk to Silinki wa Namunguba
The ostensible king of the Manani Kingdom
About the cacophonous sleep robbing
Snores of daughters and sons in neighbour kingdom of Manani
Only to cow and chicken away in a feat of prudence
Lest Silinki wa Namunguba will suspect him for being
A night runner or a thief of *** perhaps
Who roams his compound during the wee of the night
In hunt of any of Namunguba’s wife maybe
Perchance having gone out for a mid-night *******,
This is how legendary snores of the sons and daughters
Of Silinki wa Namunguba the king of Manani
Has remained unchecked for ever till today,

One time an ugly passer by happened to be seen
Traversing the kingdom of muntu
In the early afternoon some two
Hours after Walumoli the king
Had just cleared the last plate
Of the mid day meal from
His last wife Khatembete Kho Bwibo Khakhalikaha Nobwoya
He always eats her food last in the afternoon
Because it comes on the table steaming youthfulness
He loves his Khatembete wife, the wife of his old age
The wife he married by use and show of the royal regalia
The powers and dignity of the king of muntu
He married her when he his a king, the scepter in his hand,

Going back to the ugly passer by
It was never known where he came from
Not from the east where the Indian Ocean is
Not from the west where the vastness of the land
Of black people of Baganda and Bacongo
Baigbo and Bayoruba or Bafulana of Nigeria
Or the sons of Madiokor Ngoni Diop in the Senegal,
Not from the south from shaka the Zulu and Mandella the wise one
Not from north in the land of Dinka and Nuer, Ethiopian Jewish and the Egyptians,
The passerby was ugly and from no where, in a dress and
A very ***** dress that fumed out a malodorously stenching reek
He was a man in attires of a woman; this was a taboo in the land of muntu
He was left handed and a heavy weight stammerer, with an appalling
Protuberation of   a hunched back, an enormous hunchback
Enmassing entired of his masculine shoulders,
When the wind blew his loose dress followed it
Leaving the man’s thighs and then bossom naked,
Leading bystanders to a strange discovery; he was not circumcised
He was old like any other father, he had beards
But not yet circumcised, his ***** ends in corkscrew of a sheath,
This was a taboo in the land of muntu, in the kingdom of muntu
Which Walumoli wa Muntu the son of Mukitang’a Mutukuika ruled
For the spirits, gods and ancestors as well as foremen of the kingdom
Behooved that all male offsprings of the kingdom of muntu
Whether born in marriage or out of the wedlock
Born the blood or born as a ******* must and must be
Circumcised in the early teen hood
They must be circumcised before they grow the hairs
On the face, on the chest, in the scapula and on the areas
Surrounding the testicles, the **** and the endings of the backbone,
The man again had six fingers on the legs and on the hands
He walks slowly like a porcupine, his dress was in tartars
He was violent to every one he met
Insulting old people and old women with words
Of bad manners not used in the kingdom of muntu,
He terrified and beat young children, including the royal children
And grand children of Walumoli the king of muntu
He again had to beat and chase nine young virgins
Who had come from the palace of Walumoli the king of Muntu
Away from the forest when they picking fire wood
As well as playing a game of hide and seek with other palace lads,
The ugly passer by then chased to get hold of the
Nalukosi the first born daughter of
Khatembete Kho Bwibo Khakhalikaha Nobwoya
The beloved last wife of the king of Muntu
All other virgins ran home, but Nalukosi remained behind
In the inextricable grip of the ugly passer by
She screamed with hysteria of a hypochondriac
She screamed and kicked with her wholesome mighty
The stubborn passer by never left her alone
She gnawed the ugly passer by with
Her girlish claws of her fingernails
But is like the passer by was mentally disordered
He was a ******* of some time
He derived some pleasure and instead
Enjoyed the girlish scratches of his captive,
Before the eight running virgins reached the palace
Together with their companions, the playmate lads
The shrilling scream of the captive Nalukosi
Was sharply heard at the palace, first by King Walumoli
Who called his wife Khatembete Kho Bwibo Khakhalikha Nobwoya
To come out of the hut, the kitchen and help to listen,
Immediately Mukisu wa Mujonji the palace keeper surfaced
His face displayed genuine askance of an adept military man
Whose martial arts have rusted for a week without usage
He confirmed to the king that the cry from the forest
Is of the one from this royal home of your majesty the king
And none other than the ****** princes Nalukosi Mukoyonjo
The pride of her father, the eye of the palace,
Without hesitation the king permitted the wallabying Mukisu ,
Permission to run in a military dint and find out whatever that
Was eating Nalukosi Mukoyonjo the familial heart of the king,
Mukisu wa Mujonji who was clearly known in the kingdom of muntu,
For his swift running like a desert kite, he already twice chased
And gotten single handedly two male gazelles,
Without aid of a dog nor aid of fellow hunters
And delivered them to the king as a present to the palace
Which he achieved because of the speed of his legs,
On this royal permission he unsheathed his matchette
And went away like any arrow from the bow
His shirt trailing behind him like mare’s tail
Or like the flag on the post on a windy day,
Not a lot of time passed.
Mukisu wa Mujonji is at the spot of struggle,
Between Nalukosi and the Ugly passerby
There was no question or talking,
The first thing was Mukisu to sink the Matchette
With all of his mighty into the tummy of the ugly stranger
The bowels of the ugly stranger opened puffwiiii!
He breathed and gasped twice then succumbed to death.
His grip still strong on the leg of Nalukosi Mukoyonjo
The ugly passer by reached the rigor Mortis
When Nalukosi was still strongly gripped in his
Beastly hand, Mukisu wa Mujonji with all the skills
Used a Sharp matchette again; chopped of the hand
Of the ugly dead passer by off, from its torso
At the point of the muscular elbow,
Now Nalukosi was extricated, but not fully
From the grip of the dead ugly stranger,
The chopped off hand is still knotted at her leg
Around her leg, the dead hand also grips.
Nalukosi jumped here and there to throw away
The leg and the dead hand, but it was not easy to throw
The hand still stubbornly gripped around her angle,
*** time passed, each and every one of the kingdom came
Including the king Walumoli wa Muntu himself
And his nine wives, Khatembete Khobwibo Khakhalikha Nobwoya
Came last, as she was energyless due to rudely shocking tidings
Which the escaping virgins and lads had given her
That the ugly passer by had turned into the ogre
And had swallowed her daughter Nalukosi
That he had swallowed her piecemeal without chewing,
People of muntu came and found the ugly passerby dead
The left had chopped off its torso
But still hanging loosely on the leg of Nalukosi
Nalukosi jumping, kicking, screaming
Screaming away the dead hand from the grip of leg
But nothing had forthcame her way,
Walumoli wa Muntu could not afford to see
The hand on the leg of her beloved daughter
What could he tell his wife, is your all know
Dear reader and audience to this song;
Even the mighty and the wise ones
Generously bend when under the pressure of love,
Out of this dint, even before Mukisu wa Mujonji
Could display his next military card
Walumoli wa Muntu grapped the dead hand
That stuck of the leg of her daughter
And pulled it with another force that
No man born of woman has
Never used since the creation of the earth
By the gods and spirits of Muntu,
The hand come off, he throw it
On the cadaver of the ugly stranger,
He clicked and clicked and hissed
With anger like a wild turkey
In the African thorny forest,
He ordered the dead one to be buried
Their without haste, nor ceremony
Mukisu wa Mujonji buried the body
Quickly in a brief moment with precision
As if he was taking notes
From the lines of the poem
OF Pablo Neruda on how
To bury a dog behind the house
This time burying an ugly stranger
Behind the forts of the kingdom,
After all these women, children and men
Of muntu plus their king Walumoli
Went back to their houses hilariously
Broken into a song and a wild *** dance;
Makoe eehe! Makoe !
Nifwe Talangi Makoe !
Talangi!
Khwaula embogo sitella
Nifwe Talangi!
They sang up to midnight before
They all retired to their beds
Respective beds with panting thoraces
From heavy singing and dancing.

There is connection and disconexion between
The living and the dead, the living fear the dead
And dead loves the living,
The dead want the company of the living
For the living to accompany in the land of the dead,
When the ugly stranger was killed
And buried uncircumcised with the hunch
Not plucked out of his back
The gods and the livings dead
In the realm of the ancestors
Of the kingdom of Muntu were not happy,
They never wanted uncircumcised old man
With a hunch back to join them
And worse enough with the six fingers,
The gods and ancestors really god annoyed
That Walumoli wa Muntu has done them bad
He is only caring for the living, the pre-mortals
Especially his last wife and the daughter
But he has neglected the ancestors,
Why trash to ancestors a stark humanity,
They communed among themselves
And resolved to sent Namaroro
The god of dreams, dreams as messages
From the ancestors and dreams from the gods
Namaroro visited Namunyu Lubunda the palace
Prophet in the Kingdom of Muntu to pass
The message vesseling unhappiness of the ancestors
And gods in a blend of gloomy read to execute
A vendetta;
This is when in the wee of the night that Namunyu Lubunda
Dreamed and had a vision of a old man from
The east is warning of the coming long spell of starvation
That will befall the kingdom of Muntu for ten years
                                      That Namaroro told Namunyu Lubunda
As for ten seasons of foodlessness
Behold a begging kingdom
Behold a starving throne,
The scepter of Muntu is a disgrace
To the holder
Then Namunyu Lubunda set forth by dawn
To the Palace to meet Walumoli wa Muntu
In his, palace before any other royal chores come up,
Both good and bad luck combined
Only to have Namunyu Lubunda to get the king at the palace
He got him fresh and relaxed chewing the cup of fortune
In his full ego, all his wives had submitted to the morning dishes
To his dining hall in the palace, he moved his hands from
One plate of food to the other.
Namunyu Lubunda entered with a submissive salutation
To the royal, He bowed and declared the glory of the king
In typical standards of the ethnic composition of the house of Muntu
Walumoli wa Muntu Mukitang’a Mutukuika
Majave Kutusi Mbirira Omwene esimbo ya
Kumukasa,
Walumoli responded with a feat of dignity to Namunyu Lubunda
The palace prophet, as he roared to him; come in
Come in son of Lubunda son of our people,
He did mention the name of Namunyu Lubunda father
As he fears his words may escape with the power
Of his kingdom the scepter of Muntu
To other insignificant families in the kingdom,
Let me announce what brings me here; intoned Namunyu
Go ahead and announce my holiness
s the prophet of this kingdom; responded Walumoli,
Misfortune is awaiting the kingdom
It will eat this kingdom away
Like a ravenous hyena on the ewe’s tail
The ancestors and the spirits of this land
This kingdom of yours the son of Muntu
Are immensely offended with your recent behaviour
In which you commandeered all villages
In your kingdom; from east and west
The **** the innocent passer by
With your owner hands that handle the scepter
You killed and lay to rest the foreigner
A pure omurende to the kingdom of muntu
You buried him uncircumcised without contrite
In the cemeteries of our foremen who asleep and circumcised
Why did you lower the dignity of our forefathers
Who never share a roof with uncircumcised person
To share the ancestral realm; our emagombe
With hunchback foreigner not circumcised?
This kingdom is condemned to all spell of curse of death
Ceaseless hunger famines and starvation
Women dwindle in their reproductive capacity
Rarely will you come across a pregnant woman
Food will be difficulty to put on the table
Even the sweat of your brow will go to naught,
You will not be buried with insignia
Like a pauper you killed will you be buried
The house of your wife Khatembete Kho Bwibo
Khakhalikha no bwoya is a house of no consequences
For even your daughter Nalukosi stands cursed
She will not mature to be wedded into a marriage
She will hover the earth under heavy agonies of hunger,
My assignment is done and over
With or without your permission let me go.









THE FIRST SONG
Our song continues dear brethren
Come join me in arms we sing
Joyous singing of these songs of peace
Telling the world peaceful stories
As we enjoy sitting together around my grandmothers fire yard
Warming our selves to her lovely fire inherent in her good stories,
These songs will sing the glory and success of the king of Manani
It is an irregular Ode to Silinki wa Namunguba the son of Mwangani,
The son of Tunduli, the son of Wajala Njovu, the son of Welikhe, the son
Of manyorori, the son of Chumbe, the son of Kajo, the Son of Mabati, the son of welotia,
The son of sikele sia mulia, the son of Toywa,the son of siruju, the son of Mango, the son of Mulwoni sinyanya Bakhasi, the son of Mbakara , the son of Makhakara wa Nambuya, the son of Mukoye mulala kukhalikha w0nga, the son of Zumba the son of God.
Silinki

feathered shadows
ripple like the water
in the wind
on which they're cast

miniscule
molten metal
droplet beetles
dive beneath
the shimmering water

bathed in
metamorphic waves
of bending light

inobservably tiny legs
quickening
in a graceful fury

sliding through the world
like slow-motion lightning

or a brilliant spark
unnoticeably extricated
from its source

There's a passage in a story by John Buchan where a minor character explains how a good mystery story is created: take at least three random subjects or events and connect them together. Here goes.
 
A toothbrush
Covent Garden
Wildflowers*
 
Interesting to let the mind float free and subjects appear unbidden, thought Marcus. The moon had risen and out at sea its reflections caressed the swelling waves. Calm the night after such a day of being about.
 
Gregory had phoned him, early. Marcus had been lying in bed. Sylvia had just returned from the bathroom and had folded herself into his arms. Their collective feet had conversed amicably as early morning feet do. She was still tingling a little from the passion they had shared, stretching herself languorously like a cat coming into the warm after a cold night out.
 
'Marcus,' said Gregory, 'it's today.' And that was all. The line went dead, but that was all he needed to know.
 
He extricated himself from Sylvia who was intent either on sleep or further love-making. She was incorrigible, but so so desirable.
 
I'll just take a toothbrush he thought as he swiftly shaved. He picked a new pink one still in its packet and put it in his bag with the papers, a map, his camera . . .
 
He thought about Ripley as he steered the car onto the motorway. That character fascinated him and he wondered if its inventor Patricia Highsmith had ever known such a man; a nice good-looking man, but selfish and nasty. Marcus wondered if he was selfish and nasty. He reckoned he was.
 
When he reached Covent Garden, parking illegally in Jermine street, he wasted no time in walking directly to Turino's. There, amongst the tourists and the out of town shoppers was Greg.
 
'I have this little package for you. Don't open it until you reach Southwold. Park in front of the Lion Hotel. Do nothing until she appears, which she will do after her lunch with the doctor. Then follow her. We think she'll go to Ben's. If she does we want the pictures . . . and as explicit as possible. Leave the package.'
 
It's at least two and a half hours to this village on the Suffolk coast. Until Ipswich he scarcely regarded the early summer colours, the plaintive skies, fields stretching to woods, the occasional grandeur of parkland.
 
He stopped for coffee at a services and called Sylvia.
 
'Hi Sylvia it's me.'
'Where are you? I was hoping we'd spend the morning together.'
'Well Greg called . . . I'm on my way to the seaside.'
'Oh . . . no time for Sylvia today?'
'Not today'
'Tonight?'
'if all goes to plan'
' You journalists, you're all the same . .'
 
But he wasn't. He was different. He didn't just write, he could investigate, uncover things, hack into mobile phones, get the compromising images.
 
Yes, she was going to Ben's . North, on the Norwich road. No hesitation. She drove fast. He had to have his wits about him. When she turned off the main road to the mill he carried on, then doubled back and two miles further on parked within sight of the building.
 
Her red car was there the courtyard. He decided on getting in from the garden so left the road for an adjoining field. Waist high in a profusion of grasses and wildflowers Marcus made his way painstakingly towards a collection of outbuildings, the indoor swimming pool, garages, an office.
 
The pictures were good. Both of them, together. The architect and the broker. Lovers, conspirators, thieves. They deserved everything coming to them.
 
He had entered the mill briefly. There were voices upstairs, a little laughter and then silence. He left the package on the kitchen table propped up against a vase.
 
They'd been following her movements for months after he'd taken his suspicions to Fred. Yes, he'd been so lucky. A wine bar conversation, an aggrieved employee, a few leaked documents and it all came together. And now this . . . the ****** stuff the paper loved.
 
He decided not to go back to Sylvia tonight but walk by the sea, let the gentle whoosh of water on the pebbled strand sooth his ruffled conscience. He had done his job. There would be other intrusions. Investigations, revelations. Mr Nice but nasty like The Talented Mr Ripley, he thought.

you needed me beneath your baobab tree
fruit left us muted marbles rolled picaresque
through varying estates of decay
with the dawn you extricated
and as the sun you replicated
abruptly sweat shimmered
to cover your soured silk skin
turned to stone
I collapsed
smiling smoke as you died again
Goddess of this Deus ex Machina
relentlessly relieving me of anything I need to be
beneath milkshake shades of pastel plasma sky
we died
smiled together
watched eternity pass us by

One feverishly feigned embrace
And struck with hand, dagger graced
Though the votive venial
It precipitated the coup de grace

Ignorant stood captivated,
Discourse evaporated
As conspirators followed suit
Silence serenaded the orchestrated,
Symphony of treachery accentuated by sovereignty's strikes, resolute

Although he knew the fate awaited
And pain he could not substitute
The fight he would not forsake, and so suffered mute
Until his soul was devastated by the visage venerated...
The coda extricated,
"Et tu, Brute?"

I have extricated foot from mouth on various occasions
Letting fly with all my thoughts on folk and their persuasions
Brain and mouth aren't both in gear when I speak before I think
It sometimes comes out sounding like I've just had a good stiff drink

I sometimes speak without a thought of those who I may hurt
I've been told to reel it in because I can be curt
I promise I will do my best, but, only time will see
I'll make sure that the one I roast...is not in back of me!

Alone?

I stand insular in my world,
my wings are clipped,
It's my only option, Hobson's Choice is mine, no fears,
No more tears, hearts divisions, between one or two, only, not going to be lonely,
I eternally seek his lust, as a sin it's a must, same with my envy,  heralded sin in emerald green,
Not really a sinner, to me, myself, I,
I am ever the victor, I do as I please,
I sit in sight of a future, fulfilled , extricated from a bubble once burst,
Burst.....long in the past,
I am myself, my own figure head, my own mast, my own support,
Guide myself through, stormy seas, tremendous turbulent tempests, always out to get me, not,
Last word on the subject, Forget me not!
Plummet into darkness, so deep,
Then rise, rise once more,
Up above, as the dragon fly flies,
where butterflies flit on the wing, in the sun,
A solar eclipse greets my sweet lips, when we fall in my bed, fed each others' sweet heads!
Only one soul shares my bed, he's the one lives in my head,
He makes me feel sincere unto myself, always,none filled with bigotry,
Bounce right back, with self-esteem, always feeds my mind,
Walk along the tightrope wire, taut with desire
Feelings strong, feeling keen,
Mind aphrodisiac based within in myself,
Chains of resentment, rusted , dusted, deconstructed,
I love myself with all my wealth,
The chemistry I feel for me is freekin, so unreal,
Emotions, never thought I'd shatter,
Copyright Livvi Kent 24/03/2013

"I Love U" whispered the Moon  to the Sun. A forlorn look crept into her eyes. "I've always been in love with you", she whispered in a hoarse voice, choking on the oceans of love which welled up in her eyes.  A whisper barely audible and poignant.  She looked at the Sun, knowing fully well that she cud never stand in the brilliance of his love. Knowing that as the day separated the night their love could never unite. Yet she pined for him, with undying love.

She revolved around the earth, but her heart had only eyes for him. Of all the planets she had to fall in love with him.  A tiny spec, unnoticed in the galaxy.

Eclipses were short lived phenomena occurring few and far in between, rare and once in a year maybe.

But she waited for the day, when she would bask in his glory and be the cynosure of his eyes alone. She waited patience personified, knowing it was sheer madness to love the Sun.  Dazzling, hot and magnificent that he was, the universe revolved around him. He didn't even know she existed. Except for that one special day, when his eyes would notice her momentarily.

So she dressed up as pretty as she cud hoping his wayward heart would see, that it was her love which adorned her.  Just the thought of seeing him upfront would bring a twinkle in her eyes.

She waited with baited breath for that fleeting moment, shorter than a quarter of a hour. A quarter of an hour in the 8760 hours he spent outside of her world. While she waited, hopelessly endlessly, pining for the his love.

Then mockingly he came to her at last. At that designated time, teasing her about how naive she was. "Show me" she blurted with baited breath, her heart racing the universe in those fleeting moments. So he gathered her in his huge embrace and pressed his wild heart close to her breast. And in that embrace the earth was eclipsed in their union.

She could feel his wild heart through the layers of the physical distance which still separated them and she closed her eyes to his scent, the scent of the universe, that brought waves of nostalgia. She longed for more, and hugged him back. Aching to tell him how much she loved him and wanted this moment to last.  She wondered what it would be like to taste him.  She wanted his brilliance to permeate every fiber of her being.  But, she realized she was playing with the Sun.  His fire would consume her, if she flew too close to him.

He seemed unruffled, as she quivered at his touch, his scent, so full of him and so dizzy with that euphoria. Did time stop? Would the universe allow a few seconds of oblivion?

But then the world was in an eclipse. He had to leave.  So softly he whispered in her ear, "I have to leave". Reluctantly she let go, feeling the extricated from the universe, as if separating from him, meant death, fearing that perhaps this may be the last time she would see Him.

For as the world waited with expectation for an eclipse to occur and counted days when their union would be so spectacular, it also longed for normalcy.  Something wasn't right when the Moon embraced the Sun. A tiny creature smaller than the earth, she shouldn't dare hold him, they said.

She for once knew what it was to keep wandering in eternity, with so much love held in her ***** with the only hope that an eclipse would occur some day and that her yearning for the Sun would never ever fade or dwindle, in this lifetime or the next. A tsunami of a sob escaped her lips, oceans in turmoil. The door had closed on her universe, she was in a darkness. She could feel his warmth even then, but it began to grow cold. A panic started to form as she struggled to retain control.

He however, was far away unknown to her misery.  He on the other hand, belonged to the universe, no one could hold him back. Self-made, disciplined, his was a journey few would understand.

She did, she perfectly did understand. Only, she didn't expect anything from him, except few words of reciprocation. Few words, that he loved her just the same way, that she meant something to him. That his heart beat the same way for her.  She also knew that this experience meant nothing to the Sun, he would move on as he always did. He had a status to keep and the universe was watching.

But alas, he was The Sun, would he tell a tiny insignificant creature like her anything at all?

The Sun left her abode, he shrugged off the experience, and got back on his journey. While far away those watching the Sun, began to notice that a few spots had appeared on the Sun.  A memory of where he had embraced the Moon, had left a black hole on his heart.

Dedicated to the one and only man my heart loves

We met in February,
snow painted red-bricks looming,
flaring nostrils crisply inhaling;
we scampered across the boulevard
doused in the wake of passing tires.

We kissed on a Wednesday,
economically sharing a cab,
considerately a chaste peck,
stirring up a faint blush
while you clutched my hand.

I fell in love one morning
wrapped in a paradox of your limbs;
I extricated myself miserably,
condemned to hard labor
from nine to five.

You called me today,
the unrecognized number
churning cement in my stomach,
an answer to the the seven digit prayer
I left this morning on your pillow.

I’ve once heard musings**
Of recitation reflecting an area
Of negligence that should
Never go forsaken.
Now, it is through my dismay
Which triggers my optimism
To lead me to believe this
Recapitulation has been
Extricated through a
Satirical voice.
However, in the event
That theses musings are
In fact, coming from
A discernible veracity,
Then I have done to you
The gravest disservice I would never
Dream to impart.
Allow this to act as my
Expression of regret
In this particular field
Of verbal lavishing.
Before the moment
You were my salacious secret
And preliminary to my yearning
For parallel mutual devotion
My capabilities of a
Tactile sense of normality
Were fleeting
Forever consigned to oblivion
Until the moment I
Allowed the craving to coalesce
With the collective.
It was then that I realized
The stimulus of my exuberance
Was not a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Rather, one brought on
When we lay entwined
Within one another.
Further musings have been vocalized,
Drawing sight upon the fact
I am twenty-one grams lighter
Than the commune.
Albeit, these musings have
Been satirical in merit,
The inherent truth
Is not controvertible.
Thus was the preceding case
To our amalgamation.
You are the sole vindication
I have a soul.

If there has ever
Been inequity
In my necessity to
Opulent you with
My own verbal musings
I do hope this
Can act as verbatim
If there should be
Any negligence within
This particular field of
Expertise.

.They extricated colors from my dreamsand splattered them onto canvas.Natural starlight rapped softlyon my chamber door,illuminating my life.Hopping to and fro, the ravenblew out each candle,one by one...as  starlight flooded the night.Suddenly brilliance met the brush.

Afraid  of what I don't know.
love what hate me the most.
Caught in a battle to be myself
when told the best thing is someone  else.

Extricated from defeat.
Accompanied by agony.
Forced to love irony.
Humbled by deceit.

To be myself self I must stay sound
Or change my stars uniquely.
No more innocence to be found
What a battle within me.

And on the stairs leading up
your foot catches
and once extricated
catches again. Every stair
the same, every step
an effort to lift
your feet, every inch
of the way a journey.
Every stair
indented, marked
the middles pressed down
by thousands of feet
that once were here
and are no more.

After reading/listening to Rochelle D'Silva's "There Will Come A Time"

I woke up to a dream,
which we call reality,
eyes wide open, senses intact,
But who can really differentiate?

I opened my wisecracking eyes
to a photograph of father
grinning so wide, I mistook him
for an uncle I thought I’d forgot.

Prints of the past are like
yesterday’s prints of stale newspapers,
you don’t hold onto newspapers for the news
you hold on them to clean car windshields
and protect shelves from grime,
for chat-pati namkeen and peanut containers,
and then you thrown them away,
which probably get recycled;
but the prints of the past stick, no?

You cringe at the things you said
to the right person at the wrong time and in the wrong place
or five other permutations of the three.
You close your eyes hard
and frown while remembering the times
that you slipped your tongue mispronouncing
words which are in your second language,
or said things that you thought were funny,
but no one laughed.

Prints of the past are like laptop kept on for days,
just because you’d opened some tabs days ago,
contents of which might be unnecessary now,
but your mind’s stubborn to read them all.

*

Poets love the past,
it’s the foundation for words,
pain and agony, and also love,
probably forgotten in those browser tabs.

Without eyes looking out far or behind
without a past and a future,
we might feel hemmed between two walls
closing towards each other at the speed
of retracing your steps back towards
where you’re now, in the present.
What now?

When prints of the past and e-zines of the future
come to seize the end or even the journey for that matter,
when you find yourself extricated from the
vicious cycles of love and lust and and pain and hope,
when any ideas or thoughts seize to entice you,
you resort to memories that don’t make you shiver,
a delicious rub against a sack cloth to relieve an itch.

The crash of the milk bottle racks on early morning errands,
the shutting down of back doors of the bread vans,
or something out of time, something that is funny
and embarrassing that you can’t broach about it.

How seeing someone snorting back the mucus and then gulping it,
makes you nauseous but when you have cold,
you do it yourself, because the handkerchief is far,
and you'd rather not use your hand, "Eew!"

Or memories of an old friend, which is a song
by Angus and Julia stones, but also a song
of blissful senility, it’s been so long,
that you don’t remember her face,
but you still remember what it felt like
to play outside, hand in hand, panting.

Home is where the heart is, heart is remembering.

Or instead, you look at things with a blank slate,
where there’s nothing to left to think about,
you shut your eyes, get lost, probably get found.
By someone on the roadside, staring at you with concern,
perhaps that person is you.

Repeat the vicious cycle of cob webs -
love and lust and pain and agony, hope and thought,
intermittently, and then find words to write about it,
before you can’t anymore, again.

Grateful for every unbecoming scar
A soul extricated from restricting bars
Brief was the time, yet the journey reached far
Now standing upright like a timeless cedar


Raven shadows metamorphose into glorious colors
Lips curve into a radiant arc that even the sun adores
Found are the lost keys to rusty locks sealing doors
Sail the dauntless waves and leave the dismal shore

Life's greatest teacher indeed is experience
Resume painting the abandoned dream sequence
The image of a catastrophe's aftermath meeting evanescence
View life with exuberance through a new pair of lens

I never found compensation
For the love I gave.
By my side you promised you'd stay.
So I question why it is that at 4am
When I'm overwhelmed and
Open my window
To jump out and run away
I remember I have nowhere to go.
Who you were before you became insolent.
I was once subjugated to all of your requests;
Selfishness has never been more alluring.
Perhaps, in a way, you've extricated me.
Conceivably, I am thankful for that.
Perhaps one day I will learn, again,
To forgive.

I can't breathe.
The air is extricated from
my lungs by their
vacant, judgemental
stares and their obscene
words litter my skin
like the paint
that splattered my pink flesh
as I tried to paint you
a picture of what
this feels like.

No amount of water
could cleanse the feeling
of the tense atmosphere that
clouds my vision
as if I were a wingless airplane
flying on a foggy night, but
I'm not a flight you want
to take home tonight.

And I know you see
my straightened back
as another entity proceeds
2 feet too close into my
personalaized hell.

Turn away.
Pretend you don't see anything.

For acknowledging my
social anxiety doesn't
relieve me.

It causes me to be
more anxious than before.

you
me
perfectly matched
separated
extricated
skillfully patched
love
hate
Animosity hatched

I’m told that I am too young
to feel the world…

Yet,
I feel every year weighing
down my bones
forcing every archaeologist to second guess
the being they have extricated
from the Earth’s
most intimate parts

every month holding
my head under salt water
screaming in my face:
“Swim!”

every week scratching
at my skin
digging nails deep into
the flesh of my body

every day
kicking my ribs inwards
pleading for them to stab
deep into the things
they have worked
so hard to protect inside of me

every hour asking for me
to give up, give it all up

every minute digging into
my being, my existence
asking for the happiness
I have so long
perfected

every second wonders
why I am
so strong

But the clock has
yet to invert the life
it so painstakingly made
but has realized
the omission in
-DDF

six weeks later
i can still taste the
faint scent of liquor on
your breath the remnant
of our most recent tryst

the way you bit your
lip and grinned at me
your eyes flashed with
forbidden mischief
when i asked
if i could kiss you

we entangled
ourselves for a moment
extricated from the miasma
of complications our
bodies speaking words
in an ancient language
too sincere to
be misunderstood

six days ago
you asked me not
to write anymore
poems about you

i'd made you shake
your eyes rolled back
with ecstatic envy
in rhythm with  
an ode in the vein
of e.e. cummings that left
you quaking on the
brink of bliss
waging an internal war
fighting the impulse
to release the avalanche
of affection latent in
our day-to-day conversations

why stop the flow of words
tell me true my friend
my love
my muse

riddle me this
what would you have me do
when every line i pen starts
and ends with you

I extricated myself
From man's creation,
Disentangled myself
From the machines
And wires,
Walked
Off the concrete
Disrobing and discarding
The artificial attire,
Then
Stepped
Bare feet
Onto the grass
And,
Made my way
Back home.

(With a smile on my face.)

The lonely wanderer wasn't lonely though
Until she met you long ago....
There were dreams, there were aspirations
Which haunt her now and lead to frustrations

A sentence announced for no fault of hers
like a Koala devoid of its furs.
Confused, hurt and devastated she
Still longed for him to be.

Buried inside is the Love supreme
Outside clings sadness at its extreme.
A ruthless madness spreads its wings
Fighting depression and cruel mood swings.

Yes, Moving forward, forward with hopeless eyes
Bearing someone's negligence and white lies..

The stage was set, the fire was on
Into the wicked trap, the girl was gone.
Violence, chaos, ignorance and treachery
made her life a living mortuary.

Days passed, her birthday came
only to unveil the wicked game.
Ah! No, Not the flowers nor the cake
but the TRUTH enough for her world to shake.

The stage was set again,but to put out the fire
She was extricated stainless from that filthy mire.
Apparently she was out and free from her ordeal
But the social stigma won't let her wounds heal.

The lonely wanderer is not lonely now
she knows why to live, can manage the how.
Life is much more and every moment count
The heart is too small to let the grudges mount.

we slide through the grey
our eyes and words are at play
though our bodies sit still
filled feelings always spill
I miss the area I belong
even though it was wrong
salt and freckles on your skin
all the spots my lips have been
you always felt right to me
joined by our esprit
friendship and tension
you were of me, an extention
you held my hand and heart
and even though now apart
I loved you the way a lover should
the only way I ever could
with everything I had to give
I found in you a reason to live
you complicated me
you extricated me
I am grateful, though you are gone
and every day I dwell on
the feelings I have for you
and the space that between us grew

How do we extricate ourselves
from the complexity
the multiplicity and diversity
that insists as reality..
Extricate we must
if we are to discover
a real Self supplanting
our illusive separation
relieving the searching
for the missing joy..
Searching and suffering
seem  as our paths
until a vital discovery:
we are the joy for which
we search..
We are extricated..!

Sedated

    To live the life of a drug or alcohol
Abuser, I know nothing that can be related
But we all know that life can get us down
I’d still rather live it than to be sedated

There’s no judgment here, I’ve had my
Share of darkness and being frustrated
But I cannot imagine not feeling at all
Because of being numb and sedated

Livin life each day under a haze
With every moment highly concentrated
On getting the next fix to remain
Out of touch with reality and sedated

To be in a place so dark for so long
And to find yourself so devastated
That you cannot find joy in anything
And so you’d just rather exist sedated

Even at times I’ve been high and I’ve stood
At the edge of Suicide, I’ve never extricated
I’ve never separated myself to being
Dependent upon the vice of being sedated

A life of no joys and nothing to look forward
Too, not one thing that has me captivated
And only livin with darkness and pain
Until once again I can become sedated

I’ll pray for those who have found yourself
There for what ever reason, life complicated
Please know that I care for you and life is
Worth living without being sedated

Written By:Charles Kean
Copyright 12/02/2020
All rights reserved
Drug and alcohol help line
Confidential 1-800-662-4357

By acquisition of perfidiousness,
  superabundant equanimity serves as cynosure
for perspicacious circumlocution
  Extricated from acumen by coruscant conviviality
     prescient luminescence elicits magnanimous ebullience
   Profundity wrought the saxicolous
    Winebibber, penultimate in cupidity
    Unencumbered by concupiscence
   in which anomalistic accoutrements might unto be bequeathed
Alas, only by auspices, might idiosyncrasies be brought to be remunerative
As such, in trust, bellwether, to excogitate and make usufruct
is as to find parsimonious, what opulence incorrigibly writhes therein
By hedonistic primal instinct, chase, to what is callipygian