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Babels of blocks to the high heavens towering
Flames of futility swirling below;
Poisonous fungi in brick and stone flowering,
Lanterns that shudder and death-lights that glow.

Black monstrous bridges across oily rivers,
Cobwebs of cable to nameless things spun;
Catacomb deeps whose dank chaos delivers
Streams of live foetor that rots in the sun.

Colour and splendour, disease and decaying,
Shrieking and ringing and crawling insane,
Rabbles exotic to stranger-gods praying,
Jumbles of odour that stifle the brain.

Legions of cats from the alleys nocturnal.
Howling and lean in the glare of the moon,
Screaming the future with mouthings infernal,
Yelling the Garden of Pluto's red rune.

Tall towers and pyramids ivy'd and crumbling,
Bats that swoop low in the ****-cumber'd streets;
Bleak Arkham bridges o'er rivers whose rumbling
Joins with no voice as the thick horde retreats.

Belfries that buckle against the moon totter,
Caverns whose mouths are by mosses effac'd,
And living to answer the wind and the water,
Only the lean cats that howl in the wastes.
'O Jesus Christ! I'm hit,' he said; and died.
Whether he vainly cursed, or prayed indeed,
The Bullets chirped - In vain! vain! vain!
Machine-guns chuckled, - Tut-tut! Tut-tut!
And the Big Gun guffawed.


Another sighed, - 'O Mother, mother! Dad!'
Then smiled, at nothing, childlike, being dead.
       And the lofty Shrapnel-cloud
       Leisurely gestured, - Fool!
       And the falling splinters tittered.


'My Love!' one moaned. Love-languid seemed his mood,
Till, slowly lowered, his whole face kissed the mud.
       And the Bayonets' long teeth grinned;
       Rabbles of Shells hooted and groaned;
       And the Gas hissed.
(C) Wilfred Owen
Homage to the late poet; Kofi Owonor


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


In one Sunday Nation article, Professor Ali A Mazrui analyzed the inter-politicality of The Jaramogi Odinga family and The Kennedy family by arriving at a difference that the Odinga’s have curse of long life but the Kennedy’s have a curse of early death through violent and untimely  mode of death .Mazrui made these analogies in reference to violent death of John F. Kennedy and the subsenguent Chappaquiddick bridge tragedy.Similarly,the salient difference between a European and American or a Japanese and African writer or African artist is that most of African writers die early in the mid of their lives through violent death but in contrast American and some European writers die peacefully and comfortably in their old age. Early and violent death is the dominant bane, fate and misfortune that now and then besmirch an African writer. This position is in recognition of a fact that my child-hood American popular literature writers in the name of Mario Puzzo author of the God Father and Robert Ludlum an author of several anti soviet spy series like; Borne dentity, Borne Ultimatum and Icarus Agenda plus very many others like The Matlock Paper had just to die recently in their late eighties. The most surprising of all is Phillip Roth whom I read at the age of twelve years while in my primary four.  Now I am forty years and this year 2013 Phillip Roth is still alive and active to the American literary civilization that he has been touted by the Ladbrokes as a probable candidate for Nobel Prize in literature. But sadly enough on 22 September 2013 in Nairobi the black angel of early  death has carried ahead its  foul duty by claiming the life of Africa’s most honorable literary scholar Professor Kofi Owonor during the helter-skelter of Alshabab terrorist lynch of the upscale West Gate Mall in Nairobi.
Actually this essay is meant to be a deep felt homage to the late Kofi Owonor, Killed by Islamic terrorists in Nairobi. However, the essay also goes ahead to decry the violent and early deaths of several other African writers. The deaths which have almost turned Africa into a literary dwarf if not a continent of artistic bovarism. Kofi Owonor, who peacefully and honorably came to attend Story Moja Literary festival to be held in Nairobi, was violently shot by the Islamic fundamentalist terror group known as Al shabab. Whose gunmen lynched the Mall in which was Kofi Owonor and his son. The terrorist were sending out the Muslim catchword on which if one fails to respond then he was known not to be a non- Muslim on to which he is shot or held hostage for ransom.Fatefull enough, Kofi Owonor was not muslim.He was an elder, an Africanist, a scholar, a poet, a realist, a rationalist, a Christian, a religious non-fundamentalist and a literary liberalist. He could not respond with any tincture of religious irrationalism to the question of the terrorist. He was shot dead and his son injured. Too sad. This is actually the time when Christian positivism goes beyond rigidity of other religious affectations in its classic assertiveness that the devil kills the flesh but not the soul. And indeed it is true the devilish terrorist killed Owonor’s flesh but not his literary soul. They are such and similar situations that made Amilcar Cabral to observe in his Unity and Struggle, in a section on Homage to Kwameh Nkrumah to rationalize that the sky is too enormous to be covered by the palm of a sadist nor to be vilified by the spitting of the filthy ones; Truly, like Nkrumah, Kofi Owonor was the sky of African intellect never to be covered by the brute of the cannon from the parrel of a Muslim terrorist.
Kofi Owonor is not alone neither are we alone. You, my dear reader and I  we are not in any historical nor literary solititude. In Africa God has blessed us with the opportunity of the dead relatives in the name of the living dead. We are not the first and the last to grief. Owonor is not the first and the last to dance with fate. Even Ali A. Mazrui in his literary expositions of 1974 otherwise published as the trial of Christopher Okigbo.A  novella in which Mazrui cursed ideology as an open window into the moving vehicle that let in  a very bad political accident to Nigeria in the name of Biafra war which claimed life of  Christopher Okigbo at the Nzukka battle front. This was one other sad moment at which Africa lost its young literary talent through violent death.
Reading of African literary biographies in all perspectives will not miss to make you attest to this testimony. Both in situ and in diaspora.Admirable African American writers like Malcolm X, and Dr Luther King all died through violent death. Even if in the recent past, the Daughter of Malcolm X revealed to Sahara Reporters, Nigerian Daily, that Louis Farrakhan was behind the assassination of her father, wisdom of the time commands us to know that it was evil politics of that time that made Malcolm X to die the way international politics of today in relation to crookedness which was entertained during the formation of the state of Israel that have made the son of Africa professor Kofi Owonor to die.
An in-depth analysis into the life and times of African writers and artists will show that the number of African cultural masters who die violently is more than the number of those who died normally in their old age. Some bit of listology will show help to adduce the pertinent facts; Patrice Lumumba, Steve Biko, Lucky Dube, Walter Rodney, Tom Mboya, J M Kariuki, Che que Vara, Ken Saro Wiwa, Anjella Chibalonza, and Jacob Luseno all but died through violent death. Lumumba died in a plane crash along with Darg Hammarskjöld only after penning some socialism guidelines. After writing I write what I want, a manifesto for black consciousness Steve Biko was arrested and tortured in the police cells during those days of apartheid in south Africa.Biko died violently while undergoing torture in police cells. Lucky Dube was fatefully shot by a confused ****. Walter Rodney who was persuaded by his student who is now the professor Isa Shivji at Dare salaam University not to go back to his country of Guyana, desisted this voice and went back only to be assassinated in the mid of the rabbles that domineered Guyanese politics those days of 1970’s. This happened when Rodney had written only two major books. How Europe Underdeveloped Africa, being one of them. Tom Mboya was shot by a hired gunman in down-town Nairobi, some one kilometer away from the West Gate Mall, at which Kofi Owonor has been shot. Mboya could have written a lot. Even more than Rudyard Kipling and Quisling. But fate or bad luck had him violently die after he had only written two books; Challenges to Nationhood as well as Freedom and After. Both of them are classically nice reads until today. He had also submitted sessional paper no. 10 to the Kenya government which was a classical thesis on Africanization of scientific socialism.
J M Kariuki, Che and Saro Wiwa are all known for how they violently died. Powers that be and terrorists that be, expedited violent death against these writers. Thus, brothers and sisters in the literary community of Africa and the world as we mourn Kofi Owonor we must also let Africa to unite in spiritual effort to rebuke away the evil spirit that often perpetrate terror of violent death which  especially  claim away lives of African writers.

References
Ali A. Mazrui; Trial of Christopher Okigbo
Amilcar Cabral; Unity and Struggle
Yenson Jan 2019
I can smell their cowardly fear
their frantic desperation is palpable
they stink frustration and boiling envy
their lies, scams and foul smears unravelling
coercised crowd seeing them for the scums  they are
they garner contempt hidden for fear of not belonging
a lot afraid to tell them they no longer buy into their mischief
behind their wicked backs the immigrants are disgusted and sick
sick of their characters, their indulgences and their empty arrogance

The immigrants know it's all racist hatred
they now know the poor man did nothing wrong
know how pathetic and sick these wanton devils are
know these spoilt ignorant rabbles are souless juveniles saps
laugh at them behind closed doors amongst themselves silently
while pathetic thieves and dim-wit associates boast of their power
power of cowards and scums and workshy semi-illiterates sad fools
resenting success and hard working people who put in the hard graft
jokers and fantasists too stupid to really see what's happening in light
Deb Harman Aug 2014
The Venom

In the heat of darkness
the venom is circling your veins
cold is freaking rabbles

As scrambled the misty damp
ground of  cemetery road
broken in pain of aching heart
tearing in the insides broad

Only one road to flee
from the pits of venom vile
it's a lonely struggles to keep
the faith in the tremor

To the angels of light savor
wake with freely from
the crawling venom leaking
in the veins of bodied creed

Only one road to flee
from the prudent smell by sin
it's stench is untidy of fear
in the air of darkness conduct

Searching in the sleep
wake with freely from
the crawling venom leaking
in the veins of bodied creed
to find the angel of light savor

By the side of light dawn rise

The Venom
By Deb Harman ©12/8/14
(Dark Poetry/Spiritual/life/Soul
Yenson Oct 2022
In pitying mirth
find the fables of the rabbles in gabbles
in deranged discontents they babble in torments
squirming in turmoil and jiving in envy
pathos à la pathetic

See absent gumption
wild in pale volitions of limitations
basking in bitter ecstasies of fantasies in lunacies
the dances of the outers in tatters
engrossed in morose

Tell the blind minds
the eyes sees nowt in land or seas
and thumping is merely razzle- dazzle farting
the crude inane gases of the vacuous
demeaned flow of the lowly

In pitying jest we see
haters will hate for its what they do
whence no gifts or talents to grade or loftily parade
those distinguished are not anguished
dregs always sink while cream rises
Satire about the war in Russia and the Ukraine. We pray for Peace in our world.
Western fire power is awesome....don't mess with them...haha
C N Kumar Mar 2014
Oh earth, in burning of sunlight
When see from street childhood,
Flowered smooth sound of smile?

Oh child, who mud finger put in mouth
Run and hide in this mid street
This for yours noted memorable day
And suggesting day of eats mind sweets.

Ridded, very fast and strength of world
And bitten screams are drown that chariot sound
All doors are closing for that sound not fall in ears
Shutter down of eyes for not seeing of street views.

Update our evening status
And wishes of the universal childhoods
Discuss with like and comment
During early morning
When sung the song of obsequies
For orphan childhood  
Open slowly your left eye
And see down in 6th floor
A colony behind your flat,
Under a plastic sheet roofed hut
How many children sleep with tiered
And not filled food even half stomach
And disturbed, turned and turned

What! Are you close your window?
Are you disturbed in that mid night views?  
Calm sleep your babe on form mattress
Look up and had deep breath from you.

Oh earth, in burning of sunlight
When see from street childhood,
Flowered   smooth sound of smile?


Discussion will improved on visual media
And the words are take sides  
Colony rabbles, future quotation militants,
Pimps, prostitutes,
Award them various statuses
And put up more rehabilitation charts.
Years of years entered in rule machine
Not getting salvation that scheme
They are secure sleep in urns
And souls of promises are spread in surrounds
Oh babe, all are in workshop
For making of yours dream land
And you, fall in mud pit of path side
Like a Skelton, like a fermenting worm
To seek food in dung pit with dogs
Still day and night competition pursues.
All dreams are reflect in deep eyes
Like fade out pictures
To sow, which letters seed?
And hence which tongue’s songs
To contribute,
And fill millions of stars flowering
Oh my child, in your eyes.

Oh earth, in burning of sunlight
When see from street childhood,
Flowered smooth sound of smile?
=======================C N Kumar.
Yenson Sep 2019
Drunk on polluted farts of the left winds
pulled by long noses into witless pens spewing red ink
artificial energy from Columbia and caffeine powered husks
vacuous soldiers of Mao and Lenin re-drilling Winter Palace debacle
woke world of plastics damaged to plastic pollution by damagers fair

Narrow minded short sighted rabbles humming
Laissez-faire sanctioners regulating home-brewed hocks
equal distribution is hatching Gullivers limb by limp to feed giants
makes sense in the senseless vacuum of bacon slashers by Farm pigs
beasts of every land and clime this is the new world order by crimson

Pol *** psychologists are making the future
cancerous and caffeinated they read minds and pull strings
power is making my bad choices, frustration and inadequacies yours
two wrong makes right and dare see left as a wrong or you are goner
altra right come take lessons on how to mask and leave pointed hats behind......
The pigs gained leadership because they were recognized as the cleverest by the other animals. Someone had to plan out the work, Pigs power rule OK.
Promote death culture at your peril, as the moon holds lunar terror:
The Book of Life, the distribution of souls & the judgment of error,
emerging Jesus's thousand-year reign, hellish fire to the evil wearer
Christ's millennial kingdom that'll destroy Lucifer's demonic bearer
Big Virge Sep 2020
MAN These HOSTILE Environments...
REALLY NEED RETIREMENT... !!!

From WINDRUSH’ Scandals...
To... Black Lives Battles...
These Environments RATTLE...
And HERD Like... CATTLE...

The Types of RABBLES...
Who Want To DISMANTLE...
The Types of Panels...

Where Racists LIE And Then Decide...
What’s... BEST For Black Lives...
When Our Lives FLATLINE... ?!!!!?

Because of Designs...
Where Environments HIDE...

How Racism Lives And STILL ENLISTS...
EVERYTHING From Politics...
To... Employment Tricks...

To Make Things HOSTILE...
For Blacks NOT On Trial... !!!

But You’d Best BELIEVE...
That These LEGAL Teams...
AREN’T... Squeaky Clean... !!!

When It Comes To BLACK DREAMS...
of... Justice Peace And Equality...

Where... HOSTILITIES...
Are REMOVED QUICKLY...
From Where Black Folks Be... !!!

From Jobs To The Streets...
To... Dealing With Police...

Where Hostilities Supply...
Environments Where Black People DIE... !!!

EVEN When They...

DON’T Commit The Type of Crimes...
of... Corporate Guys...
Or White... PAEDOPHILES... !!!

Whose Environments LINK...
To The WEALTHY And RICH... !!!

Who DON’T Feel The Sting... !?!
That Environments Bring...
To... Young Black Men...
And... Black Women...
When Policemen Decide...
To Be MORE Than Hostile...!!!

When They Feel That They...
Can Act ANY OLD WAY... ?!?

When Dealing With Blacks...
And Those Words Are FACT... !!!

But... HOSTILITIES...
Have MORE Subtleties... !!!

When It Comes To How...
White Employers Treat...
Black People Like MEAT...
When We Work For...
... Their Companies... !!!

Where NEW Slavery...
Is The Modern Theme... !!!

That STILL Deals In Hostilities...
Because of... Policies...
That DON'T Seem To Deal...
In Fair PAY Or Opportunities... !!!

Like Our Counterparts Get...
Because of Their WHITENESS... !?!

So Now... UNITY....
Is Now Proving To Be...
A BIG PROBLEM SUDDENLY...
In... Twenty Twenty... ?!?

Where... HOSTILITIES...
Are Now Being ERASED... !!!

But Is That...
... REALLY The Case... ?!?
Because I Read Today...

That... Melissa Rolfe...
Has Lost Her Job...
Apparently Because...
of... Political Moves...
That She Claimed Has To Do...
With... Her SUPPORT...
For... Policeman Crews... !!!

Because Her Stepson...
Has Now Become...

A Policeman Charged...
Because He Chose To Shoot...
Just A Little TOO FAST...
At... Rayshard Brooks...
And TOOK His Life...
Like Some Kind of Crook... !!!

The Environments Now...
Are Getting MORE HOSTILE... !!!

Because The PC Crowd...
Are Now SHOUTING LOUD... !!!

… Tearing Statues Down... !!!

And In My Honest Opinion...
Are Behaving Like CLOWNS... !!!

Just... RUNNING Around...
Who AREN'T THINKING About...

The PROBLEM That LIVES...
Because It’s... POLITICS...
And The Racists Who...
Are Hidden From View...
Who They NEED To Bring DOWN... !!!

Because Things WON'T CHANGE...
Because of Disarray And Violent Displays... !!!

It’s IN COURTROOMS And Chambers Too...
Where Laws Are ABUSED And Used To Set LOOSE...
HOSTILITIES... That Now Need To CEASE... !!!

Because The Race War Now...
Is What’s Causing FROWNS...
And Environments Are...
Becoming Like WAR Grounds... !!!

And That’s NOT A GOOD LOOK... !!!
Like Something OVERCOOKED... !!!

There’s NO Doubting That...
The System Is STACKED...
MUCH MORE THAN Heavily... !!!
Against Those Who Are BLACK... !!!

But We Need To RECOGNISE...
Who It REALLY Is That We Need To Fight... !!!

So I’ll REPEAT The First Lines...
of This Set of Rhymes...
Just... ONE MORE TIME...

For Those Who USE Their MINDS...
When It Comes To The FIGHT...
To Make... RACISM DIE... !!!

Because...

What REALLY NEEDS RETIREMENT...

Are These POLICIES...
That Are Used To BREED...
And Now... INCREASE...
These Political TYRANTS... !!!

Who Now Seem To FEED...
Off These.....

“ HOSTILE ENVIRONMENTS “ …
A phrase clearly created in the UK by the likes of EX Prime Minister, Theresa May, is now causing dismay all over the place, but the question of a solution, is proving to be, very difficult to find a suitable answer for ....
Yenson Sep 2019
What does an Alpha
have to do with the sniveling Betas
when one is hued in strength and wisdom like Atlas
and lagging behind are worthless Betas who are putrid haters

No crowns nor wisdom for Betas
all brawn and never in Olympia for nectar
mired in the craven underworld yelling at their betters
the galley slaves in mud splattered tunics as living spectres

Beneath noble feet they crawl
from ignorance they gaggle hemlock
in fear and ******* by centurions they hail and bawl
as Princes in chariots walk on marbles in envy the betas squawk

So What does an Alpha
have to do with the unrated Betas
when one is hued in strength and courage like Atlas
and lagging behind are worthless Betas who are reptiles and gators
noisy rabbles spawns of ******, vandals and cutthroats with cutlass
Yenson Oct 2019
In insular paleness
drunk on indulgent arrogance
sloshed in jingoism of limeys incandescent with entitlement
they scribbled their scripts and laid tracks for their memorials
chorusing punk songs for punks while standing in sightless mirages
seeing is not theirs in this drama of madmen, dogs and the midday sun

In this isle of Dogs
birthed in fevered mental omissions
the witless cooked arsenic pie and mash feeding their kit and kin
we are pirates from the streets rings out in rallying calls shamelessly
while another deranged faction chorused 'we are Robin Hoods we are
and we see the dark Ages in the twenty-first century as Neanderthal minds frolic

In the green and pleasant fields
the sheep are fed hallucinating grasses and lying lilies
Simple minds sing Ballard of the Streets and Ghost Dancing, on loop
the rabbles, the Protection Money Racketeers, the Thugs and Pirates
with all the sheep became members of the Trade Union Congress
and in the bay of Pigs they are minting badges to honor and praise
People power
Anybody caught smiling or laughing or smiling will be shot, this is a serious piece on Revolution and extinction of Royal parasites is more important than climate change. Though this revolution is Crooks and Protection Money Racketeers' inspired, I have you know that Criminals rule the world, only yesterday,  11 hours ago - Ovidio Guzman Lopez — the son of jailed Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman ..was captured during a gun fight in the streets, , confirmation came that Ovidio had been freed from custody when his gang made an offer the Colombian Government could not refuse. Go check it up if you do not believe.  CRIMINALS RULES OK!
Aditya Roy Jul 2019
Living in the metropolis of tumescence of vast objectivity
Rabbles and roads and rolling ditches, some damsel being diminutive
Rambunctious raucous youths of roaring tigers in rearing farms
Raging lions in the rhapsody of bellicose bullish belligerence like diction
A corporeal of positively rhapsodic feeling ****** with George and gorges, protean germinus
The syllabi of syllogisms and schisms and oysters smitten truth and hidden haikus
Forsakes scientific fact and *****-shriveling act perniciously for thespian spring fixes
Invectives, ice, and censuring fornicate in an intermittent visceral vision of eternal springs
Of attainable wisdom willfully stirs the ***
Inferrable this clear existence in this penetrable mind can be called pleasant and puerile
Unperturbed and undulating do not work together unless zaftig and scrumptious like scones on summer sign
About your corsets strangulating and stifling your instincts' seceding their senses to the serene providence
Adumbrating the vacillating mind of a God-like might
Stagnancy stoking storied sullen somnambulant sadistically serried, Zeus caring and giving
Dreaming is a pain, dreaming is a chain
But, not in a maiden's caregiving nature
It isn't rudimentary to eat at each letter of this basal dictionary, as words expand in the context
Like the word is word, so spread it and mean it
Just like your legs, just to make sure that the words don't hurt
****, Love. **** Happens
Yenson Aug 2021
Have you seen the latest news
did you read gutter press today
its same as same is malicious bile
Climbing lows to reach still lower
******* fetid decaying minds ajar
Gather round and hide your contempt
barely glance at how the insecure thinks
mindless foibles of the immature rabbles
Displaying wares of feeble innards and fears
tis all they court from life in shady wilderness
The brutish thoughts of the untrained labourers
introspections of hackneyed snake-oil merchants
The outputs of the gainsayers unskilled in life's takes
where under the canopy of stunted growth they dwell
in vacuous flings and malaise they expose their afflictions
Inadequate insecures fight themselves with owned weaknesses
Yenson Jun 2020
The finesse of Grace knows
Real Princes do not come a dime a dozen
neither do they swagger unnoticed in the pen of yokels
or sit in taverns in abandon ribaldry with the carpetbaggers  
or with haymakers and the naysayers brigade of lame affiliations

For t'is highly and lowly known
these duds merely mouth off in vacuous tirades
filling the air with the stench of uncouth notions
reeling the politics of the gutter parliaments in absentia
in the rabbles House of commons of the uncommon senses

For strewth they have to display
starved attention makes for attention seekers
the alchemy of the reprobates and fishmongers
brews elixir of stunted minds in vivid hallucinations
ungainly choristers yodeling the hangman's blase anthem

As solid as the pillars of Athens
privilege is courage bravery knowledge and truth
freedom comes in cerebral leverage not hedonistic sermons
the scale of mother Justice holds balance in equity not disrepute
we uphold the dignity not the shallow vowels of repugnant liars
in guided light we pour scorn on the johnny come lately cultural bandits
Yenson Apr 2020
I get ME from A to Z
so, how can you who's still trying
to learn A B C
from Western Taliban Teachers
who thinks they are Oliver Cromwell's
and in modern day Britain
sees King in normal man
and spend invaluable time
plotting revenge and beheading
go on, tell me how you think
you can advise me
or heed anything you say or do

Do I live with you
in Cloud Coco Land
where your brains has frosted with the chills
and you believe that I'll leave a woman I really want
and sit around waiting eating cheap chocolates
or worry about my height though I have a mighty sword
or believe I have a horse head when I know you are all blind
or sit guarding possessions that do not define me
did lin and lisa see any shingles while gobbling away
go say your **** to your skid marks
cause I know I am scrupulously clean

I get ME from A to Z
all i see from the aggrieved unwashed
is that mudslingers have ***** hands and ***** minds
now I know faceless cowards are faceless cowards
projecting their inadequacies terrified of exposure
pedos and perverts talking about love
crooks, thieves and charlatans preaching democracy
demented Western Taliban's on ******* crusades
anchoring their shame and disgrace on the innocent
the ragged rabbles, our modern day Cromwellites
the sad laughable obsessive sickos
Neo-Croms are stalking the land: these are the new Cromwellites who want to deprive society of all beauty, joy, rite and ritual.

— The End —