"lessing" poems
Hail in peace wherever you abode now, dear Nadine Gordimer
You white daughter of Africa, the pen-mistress of July’s people,
You are the lover of July, your holy months of literature
That similarly gave a ****** grave marriage to Maziz Kunene
The African saint of orature; And Okot P’ Bitek, the lion of Gulu,
July have wedded you to the sombre grave in the Jo’burg,
As its apparatchik, the menacing jaws of death feel humdinger!
O! Dear little daughter, cursed are the jaws of death
They have kept on wooing and wooing you relentlessly
They have yearned for your betrothal with mad jealous,
For your iconic position in white African literature,
In which you stand with soldierly embrace a Nobelite,
They have now taken you to their inner chamber nuptials in death,
Before anything; let them now pay dowry to your bothers;
J M Coetzee, Alex La Guma and Dennis Brutus,
For there’s is a competent herds boy, a black shepherd;
Ezekia Mphalele, his living soul will keep the cows
Off down Corner B of the troubled African Image.
Say hello for those you are with in the current realm,
Say hello to foremen and fore daughters of Africa
Those that chose to visit the realm of ancestor precociously;
Say hello to them; Angelo Maya and Doris Lessing,
Let their caged birds and blooming grass sing uproariously,
Marriama Ba and Margaret Ogola, African girls,
They had a long letter and the source of the river from black dialectics,
O! Dear old baby Nadine Gordimer, stand firm in face to face with nothing
Other than the present time you’re in; the Africa’s realm of living dead
To sing the ballads of anti-apartheid both in heaven and on earth,
The only true testament of your footprints on the global sands of times
That Nadine Gordimer, July’s white-African daughter is deadly alive!
Jul 20, 2014
Jul 20, 2014 at 9:18 AM UTC
Blessing from God came to this
Universe to fill my heart with love
To you I write this poem
Trying to show you I care
Ever shy of my presence
Rosy, posy little feline angel
Came to me to be my little friend
Unicorns dance just for her in fairyland
Pouring my words on paper just for you I write
~Marian~
Apr 6, 2014
Apr 6, 2014 at 11:01 AM UTC
Following the bloodstains home,
we tread the land with bristled soles,
to cleanse the souls of the wide-eyed youth,
spectacular fireworks to alter the truth,
tar the land, and pepper the streets,
concrete the corner where strangers meet,
the placebo joy of the modern life,
left vacant in the money-man's wake,
a cardboard lot left to decay,
oh, this is my Britain of today.
The newsrooms are clinical,
policies in place to reduce moral outrage,
to reduce it to a hysterical mess,
a cartoon-disaster of life's distress,
so the public in fear, exist but not live,
to fight the recession; you must give, give, give,
give, your life to your freedom
to live without choice,
you can sign a slip,
to mimic a voice
and to ensure the vow of regular pay,
oh, this is my Britain of today.
A history of salvation,
we lend heroes to established truth,
we parade on corners in our concrete joy,
rejoice in the miracle of the new royal boy,
who shall live in fat, and live in health,
sacred tender to the country's wealth,
of empire and power of totalities,
of stone-walled cities,
and Northern breeze,
the Jack tattooed on imperial flags,
oh, this is my Britain of today.
A stream of entertainment,
how it pounds the floor in seamless sound,
how it drizzles the walls in a trophy glitz,
a hypnotic and false, synthetic blitz,
of caffeine veins, and digital sea,
of attention-span in atrophy.
Wait not on thoughts, instead mind-chatter,
you say “don't talk on dark topic,
and keep depth away!”
oh, this is my Britain of today.
Following the apathy home,
I tread the land in heavy-worn soles,
to cleanse my soul of restricted air,
to dream of travel, to fortunes fair,
but in this bliss of a greener grass;
it is for Britain I hold communal mass.
For each Blair, I know, is a Rupert Brooke,
each levelled city, there's Wilfred's book,
or some Dickensian dream of caricatured past,
where only tyranny is built to last,
for each liberty taken, is Huxley's piece,
is Lessing's thoughts and Shelley's release,
and the meander of Avon through grey rain,
adds desperate poetry for the lives still slain,
so we can live in peace, and in sugared tea,
with red wine lips on the periphery;
in those day's hard living,
in those days' worth spent,
with only a book
and blood descent,
the community dances in the advent of May,
oh, this is my Britain of yesterday.
Jan 25, 2014
Jan 25, 2014 at 12:44 PM UTC
We greet each other with apologies
Followed by instantaneous forgiveness
Silent, mutual
Screamed with half-smiles
Shy and sweet
We are polar in circumstance
From birth and forever imposed by this
Society
but we are connected by the meridian
of silent looks, obvious telepathy
but we are too rational for that
You are explicit with your shame
Your debt to me
You apologise twice more
“I’m sorry I cannot give you time”
“I’m sorry you are lonely”
A benediction,
“I hope you are not stressed”
We both know why you are sorry
You are the one
With the white picket fence
The obstacle
While I am free but kept wanting
You are sorry we only met now
I reply with my best grin
Feign confidence and
Reward you with my most beautiful laugh
Carefree; that would fool most people
But we are not most people
You know how I hurt
You are sharp
Like freshly clipped nails
I am not; I’m only beginning
But I am the loom that slowly weaves
The frays you’ve snagged
I am the carrier of your hopes
The executor of your will
So I write this poem
To keep me warm
in cold evening train rides and
The general banality
A fan-fic, of the thin pamphlet
That is our fleeting meet
I know you want to read me
Like the latest best-seller
You see clues, a blurb
My handwriting, erratic like yours
But more forceful
The authors, films
And tortured rock goddesses
I adore
My English Lit textbook
hidden in my drawer
dog-eared And scribbled
at Lessing, Rushdie and Joyce
I know you read it on Sunday
When no one was at work
Last night I covered my face
With a clean white sheet
And pretended to be your bride
I’d stand in front of headlights
Just to see your shadow
By my side
Mar 23, 2015
Mar 23, 2015 at 8:02 AM UTC
w
w
wh
what loves
this
I?i
loves the
rushing of in girls
Summer when heat
does its lips in forked
seething.
I loves
the hush
of almost winter nights
and the concise
melancholy
of empty rooms.
I loves
the by
cherriest of wristness
to loosely
in vagrant slumber
stir whitely.
I loves
the brother of my brother, and
the little timid
of barely unviolence boys
(in fists very tightly which).
But.
w w ww what loves
Iis
the most
of life
and lessing
too
of it
into
primest daftness of sleep.
Nov 14, 2013
Nov 14, 2013 at 4:00 AM UTC
Misery owns me...
Angels and harmony, to till a silence
With the mouth of where simplicity has a means
To an end, of self and occlusion to find, a chance
With the hours of love
In the circle of friendship, we dote
Is a mercy in form and function, if not a covenant
Of success in its drive, to the names of an infinite vote
Strangers of pasts, in the seem?
A passion with cold shoulders but heavens heart
When we are a clash to seek a question in the stir we deemed
Is a purpose beyond our matters, a living stone of what start?
A trying hope, in the needs of mere, than a person justified...
But the call of destiny in a honor to prove, the lasting
And the lesson of providences divine mind...
Where one more soul to take the liberty, outweighs even love to lend
Running for privileges seen, patience in a worthed peace
Stopping not, for pride, the tows of when suppose is a swallow
Of complexity to turn distances into another soul, of these
We have met the only God of powers, ourselves to know better allowed
Misery owes me...
Readied kind, and salute to wishes I will keep, in know
The better of many things, the truth to rally a sojourn to we
The people of history, with a moment in the sun and its care, more
Nov 20, 2023
Nov 20, 2023 at 1:58 PM UTC
Let's break apart the cymbals and the clashing of the time
remember what is holy and makes all of you divine
There's more than just a blessing in the melodies we seek
the grace we dare bestow will find its strength upon our knees
Whatever we remember and whatever we let go
will make itself a pillar in the places we will know
I'm not the only seeker and I've learned along the way
the people we connect with are the ones who choose to stay
And even as we grow in all directions that exist
the truth remains the same for those who bow their heads to it
I live, I serve, I love with every cell I see and feel
your presence in my life remains the only thing that's real
Nov 30, 2015
Nov 30, 2015 at 9:20 PM UTC
In the dark we groove for light
Awaiting again the lion's roar
To awaken us from a stupor
A Maniac infuse to our culture
Mislearnig adventures incured by our search
Searching for light with the touch in hand
Searching within the endless tunnels of knowledge
Bellowing our rich forest and mangroves
Bastadizing the deep sea of life bestowment.
True and of a truth...!
Silence is a guide but we lost touch of the hunters skills
Skills that unwind the pantheon, crossed the hyaenea
And put paid to the antics of the Foxes
Our quest is now an inquests
Following the foxes of this sphere in a hide and seek dance
A salient dance of alienation between the Hunter and the antelope.
Will the lion ever roar again..?
Chinua Achebe, Kofi Awenora,Senghor, Bongo Mbeti,
Dennis Brutus, Alex La Guma, Anthol Fugar
Nelson Mandela, Cyprain Ekwensi,
Christopher Okigbo and now Gabriel Okara
....And other great lions
Living and dead whose roaring sounds
Cascades our spheres and beyond.
The great lioness;
Bessie Head, Nardi Gordimar,Mariana Ba,
Mabel Segun, Amata Aido,, Doris Lessing
Helen Oviagere, Buchi Emecheta.....!
Your breast has not dried up yet
And your ******* still drips with milk of knowledge
Only we lack sulking skills to quesh the hunger and thirst
We cry for trivialities searching for food outside our barns and homesteads
We long and thirst for great sayings with Witt
Idioms with Music accomplishments to rummage deep into our marrow
Pickerng into our very being .....Healing!
We long for the roaring Lions
Seeking sounds to penetrate deep into our persons
We long for true words and essences
Piercing through the very depths of our soul
Written by
Otuogbodor Okeibunor Abuja, Nigeria
— The End —
Apr 16, 2019
Apr 16, 2019 at 12:25 PM UTC