Sonnet XV – Love Strong, Love Strung
Sinuous flow of strength that cursed my arms
When I sweetly carried her in my arms
Sweet, sultry, succulent lips that plant smooth kisses on me
Silky and fine were the threads of her touch on me
They were the threads that knit the very fragments of me
Weaving from soul to heart and heart to soul, my very being
The very emotional core of me, slick and soft and fluid
Yet forming the tough fabric of my strength that moved mountains
Sinister sister with the fiery heart hands that wove silk
The flare of which would set the very sun ablaze.
Magma coursed through the veins of her very soft hands.
She is woman – nature’s delicately disguised explosive.
Her silken passions throbbed my very core’s strings,
Slickly slicing my steel veins and consuming men.
Sonnet XVI – Love’s Death Note
In ink I wrote
My first love note
With a wild heart
Twas my freedom
From kidshackles.
I gave it her
Bold shamefacedly
With sacredly.
That tongue from her
Without remorse
Broke my wisdom
And without heart
In blood, she wrote
My own death note.
Sonnet XVII – Kiss from a Rose
She springs out on a warm spring day
And it’s the reason you always love spring
Scents and fragrances that fill your senses
She only gives red roses, they’re her favourite
She has a garden full of them; that’s what she says
Red roses, red lip paint, red dresses
It’s what red passion she has in her veins
And so she kissed you, her fangs dug deep
The red that flowed, your whiteness stained
Unceasing fount from the red lip stains
Whose weakening power you never knew
Until it’s cold numbness felt like the grave
And its drop, it poisoned your heart
To slap the one that gave you birth.
Sonnet XVIII – Black Beauty (The Nation I Loved)
There was once a time
When your black skin was soft on my touch
I loved the course of the tears on your face
When your cry sent sweet streams that melted my heart
The sweeter part of love that flowed from your two eyes
Soothed all that loved you and showed it
But recently, your tears have turned sour and red
Your breasts have killed sucking infants
Your hands have turned daggers
In the hearts of young men that chose to love you
And you watch them bleed to death
While their sisters you sell to rapists
So why should I love you,
Beauty of the black world.
Sonnet XIX – Ode to My Girl’s Lost Toy
I took a chance
With you
I played the fool
For you
And all I had
Was you
You kept my breath.
You had no breath.
Besides, you
Were a card, lad.
But you
Were my real toy
And you
Were just of chance.
Sonnet XX – Love Stopped My Heart
Talking to you was death
Meeting you was the first
Of my many suicides.
I blinked at you and so
My mouth stopped its talking.
I think of you and so
My brain got clogged with fog.
Then I touched you and my
Fingers felt none smoother.
I held you close and won’t
Let go or let none close.
My fault was loving you.
‘Twas what stopped my dear heart.
From loving another.
Sonnet XXI – Bleeding Love
Then I’m looking at your legs
Slim, fair, slender, pure and clear.
Then I see your hips, smooth and clean
Curving inwards to your torso.
Where the water still dripping from
The bath, softly makes my mouth dry.
The soft mounting at your bosom,
Rushed strength to my palms.
But they got heavy.
My eyes, fixed on your needly fingers
Grows dim, the lids over them flutter,
Flutter, flutter bleakly, it’s my blood flowing.
Your tears flowing, dropping where the dart lingers.
Where you shot my heart with the dart.
Sonnet XXII – To the girl I once loved
There was a girl I once loved
She was fair-skinned and full of grace
Her hair was full and glorious like the mid morning sun.
Her cheeks were roses that bloomed radiantly.
She wasn’t skinny, she always carried a full bunch
And the fruits of it were ripe from the streams of love
Whose serene springs soothed me with peace?
The most beautiful creation of God
Walks into my garden in the cool shade of the evening.
Glides over my most well tended flowers
With her lithe honey-sheeny skin
She rolls over the softest growth of green in the meadow
Filling my head and the air with the scents of God
And I had not, the faintest strength to make her mine.
Sonnet XXIII – Meddling
I spoke with my friend today
He wanted it to end today
But she wants to make amends today.
I hope he bends today
“son, make amends today”.
But he took offence today
When I said “don’t lose your sense today”
Love’s the seventh sense
That took him over the fence
For I winked at his girl
In a moment I couldn’t tell
That she wasn’t my girl.
When your love’s just left you
You ought not meddle in another’s love.
Long Verses
Ode to Chinua Achebe
Life is like rain water
It comes first in drizzles
Then in trickles and drops
When its quantity gets significant
Then it stops in a sudden manner
We won’t always have a rainy day
When great men walk the land,
Leaving giant footprints in the sands
Their spirits swaying the air
Challenging every atom of creation
Voices booming in guttural, esoteric ecumenism
“Do you know me?”
The reply is humble,
For who can know,
The spirits of the great men
Who hold the land.
When Chinualumogu spoke
It was a voice that challenged
Corruption in governance,
Despotism in leadership
And racism in literature.
The prophetic voice of literature
From the literary wilderness of Africa.
Though Prophets never last and time has moved so fast
As the drizzles of your life quickly evolved
Into torrential downpours while you wrote Africa’s story,
Not just your own.
The Epic of the Firebird
In the days when the firebird
Descended magnificently over
The garden that was of Ooduwa’s care
Watered by the sweet streams that
Took its sour
ce from the golden rock.
The gently flowing stream of
Silvery, Glassy fluid of pure health
The one whose seepage released
The divine herbs whose green gave
Eternal health to man and his beasts
And the forbidden tree of life.
Ah, the forbidden tree
Took of this soothing sweet stream
To fashion for Ooduwa, the evil fruit.
Twasn’t always evil, the fruit
Never was wont to be evil
Twasn’t the desire of its creator,
The Great Deity.
Ooduwa was lonesome
He never was at home
In the midst of the joys,
The sheer joys his garden brought
For indeed, there was much joy
And relish in the unfettered flight.
The unfettered flurried flight
Of his flame-feathered friend.
The great bird of folk songs
Whose feet spread the earth beneath man.
Ooduwa’s garden lit up
At the bird’s entrance
When darkness fell, and gloom
Withered the joy of his day’s work
And the cult of powers, dark powers
Poisoned the water in his throat and
The blood in his veins, tormenting his sanity
With visions of Sango’s axe
casting bolts of flaming arcs around his work.
The glorious bird, his light
Lit the path to ayanmo.
The Great Deity’s course
For his newly found earth
And its lone earthling.
Acknowledgement
I wish to appreciate all who made the writing and publishing of this book a reality. I could never thank you all enough, my immediate family (parents and siblings) who have all been supportive of my development over the years. I also want to appreciate friends and readers for buying my books and reading them.