The Missing Me

The garden,
fresh and full.
I wasn’t alone in the garden.

I named the tress,
I named the birds and beasts, I named the river,mountains and all things.

I was happy with all I named
But a part of me was missing inside me.

I looked for this part of myself in the garden
I looked at the cows
I didn’t find it

I looked at the monkeys
I didn’t find it
I looked all around
Yet I couldn’t find the missing me.

Out of frustration
I ignored a strong part of me in the ocean of nothingness.

I ignored the rhythmic vibration that this lost self keep echoing in space.

But , one day
I slept soundly as usual
In my wood carving shade.

Maybe God came
I don’t remember
But the tortoise affirms
That He opened my body and took a rib to create the missing me for me.

Now standing tall
Standing fulfilled
Standing whole
I have found my entire self.

Ugwu David C. ©2023

Dawsk


How do I merge this two?
How do I correlate light and darkness?
Do I do away with the brightness of daylight or bask in vague thoughts of nothingness?
Should I?
Could I?
Will these sooted thoughts fetch me the spark needed to light up my world or
Merely scratch on the surface of my fears as the sun would the ocean at dusk and have me foiled?
Curled up, awake, in the stillness of the night is how I find peace.
Sitting, underneath starry skies is how I brood courage to face the streets in one piece.
Like parallel lines in harmony I see the dawsk start and finish up each other’s tune,
With little or no care if I blend in,
Saturating my words with a soothing tone.
But like black and white has different shades in expression
I am learning to grey up the dark spots of imperfection and
Whiten up the milky paths of uncertainties with rays of light.
Each day and night
Through rolling tears or stretched lips in spite…
In an endless dawn to dusk carousel,
I’ll stand,
Strong,
In between,
Tiring and trying,
Tiring and trying,
In my little caravel
Till I find my balance at dawn

Imani Dokubo
©2021

EVEN IF FOR A SMILE

As I gaze the blue sky with my tired eyes
Swimming in the ocean of my mind
Word draining and words building
My tired soul in complete disarray

Will I rise again like these ocean waves?
Renewed with strength that won’t cave in
But this weary soul needs some hope
My tired mind, helpless as all look lost

Would you like some pie sir, a whisper?
My eyes alight with a new glow at the smile
A petite brown haired girl with green eyes
With the brightest smile I ever saw

Yes please, little smiling one I croaked
I stretched forth my tired hands
My grieving soul a teary-eyed. My wife and
My little girl will not return, alas

Oh what a pain untold to lose your world
But this smiling one renewed my hope
Not to end it on this deep blue sea
But to start all over again even if for a smile

Galatians 6:10 “So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith

Ajegbomogun Olufunke
©2021

TALE OF THE HEAVENS

Far away
Away as the waters that once finds its dwelling at shore

How far is far
Are you talking about endless oceans or a stary sky?

I have lost my rhythm at the sound of the endless ocean
Scared to trace the pathway
Which I once trusted as the Broadway

The way to the Broadway can be deceptive
But we are receptive to the leading of the rhythm within
The one that leads to the path of life

The path of life
The crown of eternity
Grizzled with Gold and emerald
Joining the Herald
The cherubs and seraphs in the song of redemption

The very redemption that liberates
The one that exposes me to my strengths
The joy is unending
This song ushers me to rivers of living water

Most times I hear more about angels singing
But poetry is hardly talked about
Does the angel write?
Is poetry their kind?

If they ever wrote I wonder what colour the words displayed
But I think to myself, if Christ is a poet then maybe their is a trace that leaves clues

Maybe they write in blue
Or green, or pink,
No, I think golden, because of the golden scroll
Maybe not
Maybe black or brown or no color
Maybe their ways is a mystery to unravel

I think a greater mystery to unravel is the way they study their master through us, the chosen once, the once who have given themselves to the Word

It teaches me the true way of a living master
That conquered me in my rebellion
Adonai
That divided the river Nile

The Niles hear and see
They are receptive to the masters voice
Same way they can be with ours
Cause the signet has been placed on us

Imani Dokubo
The Alchemist
© 2019

So much to see

I’m so excited, it’s finally summer,
It’s finally time we would travel in the family hummer,
It’s finally time we would fly to a different happening corner,
My joy is so tensed, I actually feel like a Bahamas runner,
Am so happy, we are finally on the Bahamas journey.

My family is happy and free,
We are actually a family of three,
My father a father, my mother his helper, and I am actually three.
My daddy says, son there is so much to see,
The people, the children, the dolphins and also the sea.

So now we are taking our flight over the sea,
I looked through the window, there is very little I can actually see,
Everything down there is just as tiny as me,
I wonder really, Why are those large ships just as little as me.

Now, I have finished my first class tea,
My comfortable couch allows me to be very very free,
I sit back, relax and fill my mind with thoughts of how everything would turn out to be,
I am so excited, but eventually I fall asleep.

I am violently jerked out of my sleep,
Mommy and daddy are seriously praying beside me,
Mommy quickly notices the confusion written all over me,
Sweedy everything is going to be OK, just pray with your daddy and me,
The pilot says, there is a problem we cannot see,
He said the plane is not functioning as it was programmed to be,
He is obviously struggling to land the plane expertly with the help of his team,
Mummy says, sweedy, the true pilot is not him,”
Let’s together pray to the king of kings.
I cover my face with my hands and say ” God, mommy said you are the pilot of this trip, you know I am so excited about the many things I would soon see, you remember I just dreamed about the Bahamas and it’s sea, so God grant safety to mommy, daddy and me.”

After my prayer, I think I fell asleep, the next I woke up, mommy was smiling at me,
The pilot announced, ” the runway is finally free”
In a moment the plane is finally still,
I look up and catch daddy smiling at me,
He says “hurry son, there is so much to see”

Now daddy is driving us to where we would live,
The sky is filled with tall beautiful trees,
We have finally gotten to where we would be,
Everybody is unpacking and settling in,
While I just enjoy the scene playing before me.

After some time, we all went on our knees,
But before we prayed, I say, ” daddy I think God answered me”.
Then daddy said “what did you ask him”
I said, I ask God for safety for him, mommy and me.
What he replied further inspired me,
I didn’t know God died because he was in love with me,
Please remember I am just only three.

Finally it’s time to see the sea,
Daddy said “son the beach is not far away from here”
Am excited, finally daddy and mommy will play the sand with me.
We finally here,
And Even though our resort is very visible from here,
It felt like coming to the beach made forever near.

I am a child, so I am running everywhere ,
Careful sweedy, careful, mommy shouts from sitting within a chair,
All I say is, mommy come let’s play,
Mommy hurry, Let’s build our castle here,
She smiles and says “son I think the sand is wetter over there”

The evening is finally winning,
The stupid time is constantly spinning,
My Nigerian castle needs it’s final trimming,
But the sea waves think my castle is very appealing,
In a moment am crying, screaming and also wailing.

My daddy hurries over to me and helps me scream at the oceans doing.
Then he tells me, that’s how many Christians are living,
Their lives, God is constructing and building,
Then just before trimming, sin seems very appealing,
And then, He has to start from the very beginning.

What he says, has little meaning,
I stop crying and start rebuilding.
After some time, daddy says;
” son it is evening,
I feel we should all soon be leaving,
Do not ever forget that everything has its own timing,
So today you cannot get to finish this building. “

I stand up and go after the sea that is running,
I hit it with both hands and feet,
” why didn’t you let me finish what I was building”

So that’s why Jesus also came in,
He had to set us free from constantly sinning,
Remember that God is totally emotional about finishing his building,
Because you are his building.

So be like my child, kick against sinning,
Accept Jesus, his mission is redeeming.
But I have to leave,
It’s finally evening.
I have to pick up my son before the sea would overwhelm him,
Don’t let sin overwhelm you.

Look daddy, daddy look,
I think I can see the end of the sky and the sea,
I shake my head, his knowledge is just as little as he,
If only he could actually see,
If only he could actually be like me.

So dear Christian, be like me,
I hope your knowledge is not as little as he,
I hope you can actually see like me,
Because the sky and sea is much bigger than what we can actually see.
Don’t forget to note that the sky is the blessings from Him,
I hope you know there is so much to Him,
His love, kindness, mercy, and grace are all also so free,
So my dear,
Read you Bible and pray to Him,
There is so much to see.

NationalPoet
© 2018

GRACE PETAL

He is a flower of love, I’m a petal of grace.
Race me to the hour, pedal my race.
Resonate my soul to your orbit.
Traded pains… Salvation was the profit.

Drain my sins into the ocean of flames.
’cause names run off the book of life, feels like an erosion of names.
My veins were overflowing with lament.
But you made it all ferment, now my joy clouds the firmament.

My heart feels like a beating lake
’cause no emotion flows.
This vacuum you filled… I will scream till even a dumb fish in the ocean knows.
Soul once felt like a vault of darkness.
My days were spiced with the salt of sadness.

I stepped on thorns and you turn them into rose petals.
You take the drive out of my foe’s pedals.
On raging waters you left your footprint.
Your infinite love is a blueprint.

Kruise
© 2018

THE ETHNIC WAR OF INNER VOICES WITHIN MAN

Hmmm…Have you walked down this lane?
The lane of the warring voices embedded in the mind?
Where voices rage war in the soft bones of your mind,
Over choices and decisions,
Voices sounding right under the spell of imaginative confusion,
Wrong when castrated of the spell,
Where reasoning becomes afraid to reason,
Cos even in the cause of reasoning choices coated in capsules of poison seize thy taste of choice,
Confused over nothing yet confused over everything,

Drowned in the ocean of counterfeited uncertified voices draining broken pieces of unfulfilled dreams sketched out,
These voices keep on speaking,
That the only surviving cartilage in the brain of my head has been ruptured
Unseen yet powerful and influential voices, trapped in myriads of scorn,
This is an inbuilt ethnic war,
Who can save me from this destiny device,
Where voices echo unraveled solutions and complicated ideas to same thing,
Which do my being become a slave to?

Rains of confusion has embarked on a rescue journey at the central park of my head,
Taking rest at the hallucinated desolate field of lost,
The sweet and gentle voice of procrastination has embalmed its statue in me and silenced my voice of reason placing it in the solitudinal grave of eternity,

I wear smiles wrinkled on the inside,
Spraying the perfume of faded smile to avoid panel of questioning,
Inner pimples has eaten deep my dimpled mind of rest,
Hiding under the cloaky face care of MARY KAY
To bring out the dimples amidst the pimpled troubled mind,

Which voice do I cling to?
The sugar coated diabetic voice or the fading- like silent voice embedded with thorns and water logged pathway to destiny,

OH!!! OH
War of voices within…
My soul has become aged at the peak of my youthful mind,
Let me think and make one… my permanent abode for a gloomy doom await the confused mind making choices,
Follow me on my journey but with cautioned silence.

Kanu Nonye

© 2018