Tag: Chest

Chest Knot

Leave a comment

Force yourself to sit.
Force yourself to wait.
Force yourself to trust.
Force yourself to forgive.
Force yourself to laugh.
Force yourself to write.
You can’t help that you fuss yourself—
So force yourself to leave the shelf
and let your path praise the Lord.

Bring me home, bring me home, Lord.
I’m looking for a different satisfaction.
Norm told us to steal and keep eating,
The team disbanded to hunt for new stories,
And the show goes on; the sun circuits still.
I need to practice letting God choose—
For present comfort is no guarantee.

Bring me home, bring me home, Lord.
Footsteps prince me a path through the din.
Hands that held my back now applaud my stumbling—
Speaking of my stumbling:
I was sipping last ones, hoping that the first won.
And the show goes on; the trump is still blown.
All my medals rust before the changing times,
for You, Lord, were my only true possession.

Bring me home, bring me home, Lord.
These scars will follow me into victory.
Rooftop farming—aura wasn’t the only fruit.
I have witnessed enough to shrug from a cloud.
Lord, please take the pen again; write me back to right.
Outside Your Word, there was treachery that paralyzed.
For You alone are truth,
and Yours walk beneath a different sky…

…beneath a different why.

Bring me home, bring me home, Lord—
everywhere I am.

Godzniel
©2025

Words for My Father

Leave a comment

Baami,
For the times your words enveloped my fear,
Times your voice echoed courage into my soul,
And you became strength for my arms,
When the weight of the world became too heavy for me to bear,

Nna,
You built an image our lives could reflect on,
And carved words into pointers to guide us,
As we journeyed through the world,
You denied yourself of pleasures,
So we could afford the luxury we desired;
A price you’d pay as long as you had breath in your lungs,

How can I forget the touch of your rod,
A few lashes to straighten us when we went wrong,
How can I forget lessons enriched in respect, integrity and diligence,
Lessons drawn from the scenes of your life,
Lessons we could hold in the palms of our hands,
Lessons that moulded us into the men we are today!

Abba,
I choose to count my flowers while the sun still shines upon your face and the wind gently caresses you,
When the air in your lungs still warms up your chest,
And your heart still beats,
Today, I choose to celebrate you for being nothing short of a father!
Happy Father’s day Baami.


And to those Father who has gone beyond this world,
We choose to remember you and say you live on in hearts!

Olaoye Adeleye
(C) 2022

I Am Enough

Leave a comment

This feeling of inadequacy is clogging up fears In my throat I’m struggling to breathe in ENOUGH air for a day
I’m struggling to see the light my ART shines in dark tunnels
I’m struggling to see the FREEDOM bursting like light in many hearts

I stare at the stage and wish I were behind the pulpit
Spewing sleek words that must have been dry-cleaned for years
I yearn for the cameras to click on my face as I sashay even though I know my art isn’t a hundred percent

I forget I’m enough at where I am because I take my lessons
That I don’t have to prove a point, I only have to study and write my tests so every day, I can look at the score sheet, at the improving grades
And thump my chest, knowing, believing in the goodness of this PROCESS.

Everyday, I’m enough
I’m enough as who I am and who I’m evolving into

Ifiokabasi Okop
© 2020

RENEW 2

1 Comment

Listen
Your heart beats a melody
Listen
The world rejoices in novelty
Listen
You are here by another’s will
Listen
The Word is how you navigate this
Listen

You must be thirsty.
What drink would you love?
Water of life is always a great choice!
We live in the feelings of these little choices.
Live by choice.

Leave by choice
Regrets and bitterness in past 31
Lift by choice
Your spirits heights above where Jews lie
Leafy choices
Can be lost in this wind so hold tight
Newness is your guest today
Make the best of it

Dance!
When you can and can’t
You deserve presence,
Gift yourself the present of you
Now is a good time to live.
So dance, teach time to
Breathe, see, listen and feel
Make it wait on you.

St. Davnique
Godswill Ezeonyeka
©2020

RENEW

Leave a comment


Let your hair down
Breathe
You’ve come this far
See
This is not destination
Listen
But home is where you are
Feel
The moon takes us through another 31
Live

Begin by breath.
One. Two.
Exhale the stress, excess, excuses.
Inhale the miracle of your heart beating hard.

The journey of a thousand miles
One step
The expectation of many lives
One thought
This is reset if you don’t clone it
Welcome to another opportunity
Crown it

Continue by Sight.
Lashes up and it’s a new day!
We are always at the start of things
And it’s okay.

And now that I have you here,
Can you hear?
Can we sit and lock hearts?
Rest a while on my chest
I will do same.
We are simply different patterns from a cloth.
Our roads have led us here.
Let’s celebrate this beautiful silence.

St. Davnique
Godswill Ezeonyeka
©2020

Numb

Leave a comment

There is a numbness in my head
A searing pain that threatens to strip me of my sanity
And blur my senses of whatever hold on life they have left
So much that my hands cannot thump my chest
Cannot allow me to say it is alright and that I have help within
Groaning out to remind me of who I am and why there’s life in me, but I scream

The numb becomes a pain that only allows me see the trauma
And bitterness and anger I carried for so long
That I could not forgive myself because of
And has now taken control of who I am
The numb has spread to my fingers
I cannot touch my face, to feel the life that lives in me
Cannot feel the warmth on my skin
The blood that flows through my veins

I stagger backwards and I feel a panic rising in my chest
Up to my windpipe threatening to come out through my mouth and when it does
I gasp for air, for a breath
I steady myself by a wall and with wide eyes I take deep breaths
Swallowing as much as I can force down then the tears come
Willingly, patiently, next they become sobs, loud
Choking sobs and in that moment I feel the life seep out of me
Slowly, without a fight and my legs, weak, throb
Throb so bad I can no longer stand so I slide down while hugging myself

It is not going to be alright
It won’t be alright until I see the help right within me
Silently saying ‘it’s okay’ all the while I was fighting with myself
Telling me to stop and allow him fight because my defenses are down
With the numbness and pain
But I could not see it because I took my eyes off him and focused on me
My pain, my panic, my hurt and so it’s not going to be alright
Until I stop fighting alone

IFIOKABASI OKOP
© 2019

ETERNAL LIFE

Leave a comment

it was so much joy
That day I joined the life
In the race of men
I gave my first smile, looking into her face who gave me life
While mouth stocked to her chest gulping out desperately a white river
A white river that would make me strong and grow

Day by day I got to know how life is
The sweetness of it and the sour it gives
How good life could be and how evil could penetrate
I only know the first life given from a woman
But as time grows
I begin to see despite life was given life itself could be taken too

I see the young and old been taken
Taken not from the woman who gave it
But taken from another life named death
Death I was told it’s also a life
Another life not to live walking
A life laying silently below the ground
Soundless, only the cracking walking sounds of termites feasting on every part beneath the ground

One morning ,I walked down with mama to a place
Under a shield filled with different faces
Looking lost but wanting more
There , I got to know of another life
Far better than the life from a woman and the life beneath the ground

I heard of the third life
A life flowing with milk and honey
A life of peace without stress
A life which know no sickness nor sorrow
A life forever more with no endings reigning with kings and Angels
A life bought by a boy called Beloveth Son
Who give to it freely with His blood
Blood bonding is as one
That whoever believeth in Him should not perish
But have Eternal life

Deeyoke
©2019

I am here with you

Leave a comment

I look ahead, I see the past,
I close my eyes and feel the beat,
Of the chest, I tried but tears dropped,
I challenge my mind, trained my faith,

But all this while,
No better days,
I am trapped in the center, the middle,
Life is hard, much harder when you fail,
I lost before, losing again,

The eyes of the sky is black,
And the womb of hell, blue,
I am ready to go, no more,
Farewell mingling toil and wine,

But,
‘Wait!’ dear farmer If you can,
Accept this hoe for your soil if you will,
For I am the end of all sorrows, a new dawn,

So stop and stoop,
Now till and till again,
Gather all worn out tools,
For I am here with you!

Ugwu David C
© 2018