Junkie on the Block

You want to claim the easiest spot

and drink from the clearest stream.

 

You dream of having the loveliness of the lady butterfly

and glow and glow while hanging on the green leaf.

 

So you sail down smoothly into the soft woods

changing yourself often to stay like a friar in the cathedral.

 

Often you walk the paths looking out like a pregnant lizard

from her perch calculating your moves.

 

Hmm, your judgment is tainted by movies so old,

just ride the subway to where there’s kissing in public.

  

Do you know, when the market is over

all sellers pack and head home?

 

When the drumming is ended

the drums lay quiet and the dancers

go to their homes

 

Why do you linger on the streets of my peace

after you’ve dreamt the night away

and held my dreams in flickering constellations?

 

Why do you snap your teeth like a dog waiting for a cookie,

yap and bark like a pup facing terror of smells and sights.

 

I think, I have known hundred smells

but the fresh spring air has swabbed my mental deck.

 

I’ve no calendar to tell you when spring will go,

it’s as simple as that.

 

The drumming is over

and now you want us to dance to which song?

v. Once We Were One

 

Should we have stayed at home and not thought of here?

Each question we ask on the road is answered by the echo

of our voice alone.

 

All these years of talks and laughter, what did we want

and didn’t know we can’t have it?

 

All these years to offer up our specks of life

only to be imbedded in fragile fabrics of a vast mosaic body;

 

how could they defoliate the field we live from

and talk of people caring for each other, I have no answer.

 

Should we have stayed at home and not thought of here?

 

And I paused to look for peace in the long silence

and for a moment I remembered the fields of praise

on which my umbilical cord was buried; and I saw the end

just as a straw, a feather furling slowly down to a light.

 

Should we have stayed at home and not thought of here?

 

For a moment all my tears were used up;

all I could do was use my dry eyes to draw a fabled bird

migrating away from its nest and breeds in America.

 

I can hear all broods like sparrows returning

with the common song:

 

no sweating in the dark anymore, no more dying

in the ecstasy, fumbling, floundering like a slave in fire

or drowning in the lime or choking in the crowded sea

ii. Once We Were One

Once my people

we were one.

 

We felt our skins held together

and never apart. What borders did we not cross?

 But fifty miles away from the Highlife days of that March

we see with blinding sight. Just fifty miles away……….

 

and we march on heels on the Main Street

sing sin and dance like chickens in garbage pails.

 

How sweet is the dream-salt we taste

with our swollen lips. My, my, my……

Can we rage against the dying light,

bend double to gather what we lost in our fields of praise?

 

Nothing we cared for when the moon was rising

in the fields of praise is honored by the foxes.

I’m drunk with fatigue in these clumsy helmets.

I’m plunged in a gutter, choking, drowning

and these white eyes are writhing in my face.

 

You saw them bearing the farm away though

they heard us sang in our chains like wailing whales.

Oh, my, my, my…………….

Once, sweet was the wine of one flesh in the dead fields of praise

and we drank and drank.

Where are these now?

 

i. Once We Were One

For once we were nothing, but my people once
we were one.
 
Somewhere in the forgotten world once
we both climbed each other,
cleaved and cleaved to one another.
 
We both heard the years hurtling past,
whirring like gears in a hulk factory.
 
We saw kin and kith breathing,
we gathered our thoughts like defetsui leaves
For the diviner and if some death was coming this way
it will go beyond together.

Even before we took Kete to Datsutagba there were no doubts
swarming like reconnaissance planes over forests of sleep,
we were one.
 
We only heard words murmured in love.
 
What a grand time we were. What a grand time are now.
What a grand time………………….
What a grand time..
 
Where are they now?
 
 

I WISH WE NEVER MET

I never knew those supple eyes

had a maelstrom of unkind desires

hidden in their peeps and tweets

 

I never knew your embraces

have such cruelest spites

the most unkind in the divinely design

 

The lips are no source of life either,

They birthed venoms spit death threats

conceived in the darkest shadow

 

In our search for pleasure

I never knew it will be a consort of pain

that erupts agonies even in my slumber

 

they say living fire can beget cold impotent ashes

you’ve become yesterday's hot fire

that begot today's cold ashes

 

and I wish we never met

SURPRISES

The endless
doubt escapes
and darkness turns
to daylight

The deepest fear
of tomorrow
now walks in naked light

And they hide
their faces
in violet sheds of tears

Now their daughters
like Cinderellas pirouettes
and twirls their tulle “Kaba” skirts
asking for the needles they cursed
in the dark

They want the aroma
of clean sheets, to dine with fork
and knife just milliseconds
before they sleep

Surprises,
they forgot their constant doubts of yesterday
they forgot their deepest fears
of tomorrow when the journey began
they forgot they left the boat in the storm

(Padmore Agbemabiese, Cleveland, 12/21/2013)

DADDY, COME HOME FOR CHRISTMAS

(for my children)

Daddy, please come home for Christmas

soon, Church bells would be ringing;
our choir would be singing, the "Silent Night"
and the glad news of Christmas
will fill the air of every home

right now, I have no friend
to wish me greetings of Merry Christmas

nor tell me how wonderful the New Year would be
so Daddy, why don’t you come home for Christmas
for it is going to be a Holy Night with angels watching

the house next door, our relations across the road
have all put up their Christmas trees

they have even lit their candlelight in the porch
and by New Year's night friends and relations
will send each other salutations
they will drum and sing and dance

every child will dance and sing too
they will see a star shine above
and joy will fill their hearts, when Daddy walks in
to put a smile on their cheeks

my child will see no star but an empty space

void of an arm that could warm the soul
so Daddy, tell her gently how long is her wait
for you to come home for Christmas?
 
if you could come home for Christmas
our home would be a manger in my heart
where there’d be no more sorrow
and there would be no more grief nor pain
I'll just be happy, and happy in my soul
for Daddy is home with me for Christmas

Daddy, for my sake
please come home for Christmas
I want to hear the bells ring too
I want to be in the choir
when they sing, the "Silent Night"
and the glad news of Christmas
would fill the veins of my heart just because
Daddy is home with me for Christmas

(Written in Columbus, Ohio 1998)

The Stable

the winds were scornful,
passing by without a note
and gathering Angels
wondered why

Mary, a burdened mother
for God’s sake did not mind
that only animals in this world
were kind to her child.

Grandma used to say, “Who in this world
could guess that God would abandon
such a lovely soul in the middle

of such a horrible loneliness?”

and I too wondered, why

Drawing me

the road that lies ahead
is under construction

and much is yet to be done
yet, it is night

the picture from the other side
is hazy and foggy and funny
this isn’t the picture I wish to see
to let me be and become at ease

I've been to Texas
I've been to Montreal, to Birmingham
everywhere in search of me
it is mist and storm crushing my soul

many roads run up and down where I go
yet I needed only one  
where do I go with them
when I’m lost with uncertainty

climbing and scaling mountainsides
away from home chasing butterflies
that seems beautiful everywhere

I’m painting lines in my mind

as I want them to be
that makes sense in my head
and I don’t care what you may say

if the picture has no appeal
I’ll draw it again
I’ll keep drawing it till I see me
the real me in Reality

The Will

IMPRIMIS—I wish to die at the place I call Home

but it is too late now
 
my departing shadow I entrust to Heaven
my memory I give to the silent Dust
my Body I give to public censure
to be disposed off as my friends think fit
 
the miseries I brought onto my aged home
are gifts of an unthinking Youth
and at my funeral will be melancholy’s song
the only requiem fit like cries over garlic

I never thought of a chill snow-ribbed world
with a drift of rare flowers with delicate
shell-like diamonds enclosing frozen lily-leaves
their camellia textures were mere teasers
they are colder than the thorn of roses

now I know the windflower
that keeps alive the breath of ants
from the north-wind world

today I depart this world
with intimate thoughts of the place I call home
and treasure its beauty on my mind
from now I’ll reach out to share
the rare pure texture of its beautiful spaces
and long lines of marvels to grace

I will preach of its intimate hands
and dear drawn forever-green garden wards
all these sheer raptures I will take
to mold a clear and frigid statue
for small Poets to bequeath like my Pen

Prophecy

one day someday
I will claim my wings
I will seize the skies
I will take the land

one day someday
I will return your heart home
I will return your soul to the land
the land of your father's birth

you will return to the land
reading poems of love
from ribbons of human touch
drinking from pools of human laughter

you'll see dreams of amazing grace

one day some day
I will return
return in Waterfalls of Fire
I will return to trembling eyes

step on mounds of burning chaos
pick maggots hanging on mouths
crush the lies in living museums
and the Rainbow won't set

till the poor inherit the kingdom
till the hungry are filled
till they that weep laugh
in the land of their Father's birth

 

 

An Apology for Sena

(For Z and B who witnessed the slaughter)

Forgive me if I smile often, Sena,

for you are not sure if I have a heart
overflowing with love enough to ever love dearly.

You are too young to remember
how I was named in sentences of unaccented tongues,
And you do not know I was buried in an open grave
And like a poor man from Salaga I never had my say
and I took my unsung dreams with me to my somewhere

You were young then and I was too frail

to sing loudly in the court of conscience
and they all found me guilty of love
of not caring enough to love their daughter
and I died and I dreamed and I tried and I
I died of sleep. 

This was many years ago

and Zeno was away and Britt was put on pause

Sena, forgive me if I laugh myself away

I laugh and smile because I’ve unfashion the open grave

placed my swollen feet in a complex lace

and I’ve ended the foreclosures on my life

and refused to demand recompense for my heartaches

And I never cursed the Land which gave you birth

for the many heartbreaks I survived

Sena, if you see me laugh shyly

it’s because I do not have a tongue of worms
like some who expose the venom they learned from somewhere

And if you care to know

I’ll never burp you up
I will always hold your love close to my heart

 

Will Return

Whenever seconds tick astray
this heart glides into its Birth-waters.
In every slaughtering of the day
it sails in the morning rain to the place it calls home.

Many birthdays ago
we knew nothing about a landing that
will hold us suspended above our bones

Many seasons ago
When our souls arrived at the port of longing
after crossing oceans with hope in our loins 
we knew nothing about the muddy waters
or the toxic wounds inflicted by a hurricane of smiles

Today, there’re too many mournful things
to be named in a single sermon on the mount
But how to pass our songs to ancestral rivers
before time collapses in the woods
is with great difficulty

Each day we’ve seen our songs turn into germs
while our tears drowned our panting souls

How little others know about the migration of our souls
crossing oceans to ports of longings
and the stampede that baptizes our breaths
and in the midair we become clowns
chasing the Dream lost in each other’s shadows

We are still here with limbs starched to our bones
only waves of scars on our fatigued selves can say all

With no roadmap to escape from the thunder and plunder
we awake each dawn with whisper-screams and blood-tears
tucked beneath our cracking skulls

but one day, before I disappear without my coat
I’ll pick up this breath to remember me

In my dreams I rub my limbs and tell it to sparkle
with laughter on village lanes

If you meet me—A Goodnight Song to Apartheid

(for Nelson Mandela)

If you meet me sitting
Quietly, counting fingers by the moon
Like the chicken pecking bones
In the pain of winter,
Don’t think I need your tears.
 
If you meet me sitting
Quietly bathing in streams of thought
Like sad blues from the gallows
Like screams searching heaven
Don’t think I worship your name.

All these pains of drought

All these smiles of dying leaves
All these screams of a corrugated breath—
Wet blankets of colored birds
Stretching into dawns.

They are absorbing the day’s heat

They are gathering screams from the village
Laughing softly at your imperial dreams
With their hungry swords they will empty
The grief cared long by all prison-drowned souls.
 
And if you meet me again sitting quietly,
Whispering words on the back
Of the Wind don’t think
I’m roasting dreams
I’m claiming the sky like a Bird.

Post-Its of Love

helplessly yours;
I’m devoted to you after tasting your kiss;
truly, I’m lovingly yours with an eye on that elegance
kissing your smile and making my day;
please savor this while falling asleep;
I’m dreaming of you and missing your arms;
so, holding onto feelings that’s true as days are cherished;
my heart is never alone, you’re always on my mind;
is your heart on loan, it’s like drifting away;
dear, let’s bring back old memories with bliss
where with just your kiss I shiver through the body; 
choking on words and screaming for your mercy
I am your love and all
till the waters in the Ocean run dry 

Ever Since We Met

ever since we met
in every breath I take
your presence lingers
on the breast of my soul
and I feel the rhythm in my heart

in every dream of the night

your love stares at me
and with gentle smiles I hear you say
you’re the breeze in my dawn
the beam in my sunshine
and the colors in my rainbow

sometimes when I am lost

and I cling to the pillows I dream on
my soul swims in the deep streams of thought
suddenly, your love opens like petals of a sunflower
clothing me with your warm and tender love
let me say it, I’m blessed to be in love with you

ever since we met

I have listened to your soft splendor voice
heard your laughs rise into starlit heaven
they give me the power to love again

today as I journey on the streets of your heart
and dance on the breast of your mind
you are the one whose love
not even death will take from me

A Bouquet of Thoughts

 

to you, these flowers of inner thoughts l send
each one nurtured in my heart for you
since the day we met; their seeds were sown
now they look beautiful in the Moontide

where once was a desolate field
you sowed a treasure store of beauty of love
with every kind word and loving deed
you brought a tender touch and nurtured my beauty

so let me send these flowers of inner thoughts
promising never to let such a beauty die
lets endure the test of time; molding the joy we carry

weaving all into a symphony of poetic rhymes

At Crossroads

anytime the Sun rises
I wonder what the Day will bring

anytime I open my door

I know not what to expect
or whom I’ll meet
on this long road where no Heart
should beat alone

will it be the Drunk or the Bear

or the hand of gentle Breeze on my chest
to immerse me in passionate embrace 
or is it going to be
another long night
with my dreams tailored into nightmares

maybe, maybe not,

and hopefully not

A Night to Remember

last night
you made me go deep inside
the hidden places beyond eye spaces
you made me walk through the forest
to taste secret joys no one knows
you made me bathe in feelings only
known on wedding nights

do you remember anything about the night?

do you remember

the low genteel waltz across the corridors
the glee and whisperings from your lips
the spark of passion when I stood at the door
and on entering the soft secret chambers
the kiss sealed the embrace

do you still remember all that?

do you remember
how you made me dance

on the velvet platform
the twists and turns
and I wondered why
you kept under lock and key
this juicy berry for my taste only

do you remember

the emotions that flew
with the kisses under the Candlelights

it was a long night
where nothing happened except
knowing we both loved one another
warmly and until time comes, we will remember
the love between you and me

will live until time goes to sleep with us

 

Let Me Comfort Your Tears

 

if it’s love that can dry your tears
                  let me comfort your fears
if it’s love that can bring you a smile
                  let me make your life worth-while
if it’s love that can change your desert green
                  let me push away your pain
if it’s love that can make you fly
                  let me bring you to the sky
if it’s love that can bloom your heart like a rainbow
                  let me sing you a song that’s yellow
if it’s love that can break your loneliness
                  let my warmth fill your emptiness
if it’s love that can refresh your soul
                  let my presence make you feel complete
if it’s love that can bring a spark into your eyes
                  let me show you how the world is wonderful
with your love