2012: WHEN MY TRAVELLING SHOES GOT WORN OUT

2012:
a year when
my spirit got crushed
and maimed
as battles continued to rage

a year when
my travelling shoes
got worn out
as thistles and thorns
pierced my tired feet

a year when
I got maimed
in body, mind and soul

a year when
my heart got pain
for a friend
when the void in me
got even bigger

a year when
I got displaced
from the seat  of tranquility
when I lost innocence and inner sense

a year when
I gave up on dreams
and encountered nightmares

a year when
I wronged those who did me right
when I was the dark
instead of being the light

a year when
the brightest of flowers
got plucked from my life
(RIP Aunt Vic and Aunt Sue)
a year when some lights
got dimmed from my life

a year when
push came to shove
and shove to the fall
a year when I changed
from bad to worse

a year when
poetry no longer cured my pain
when art no longer hid my shame
when bad was my surname

Fare thee well 2012
I will never look back
to you with nostalgia
but since my art
is a story of never-forgetting
I will remember you
I will remember the particles
of happiness
and new friends made
I will thank the maker
for the breath of life
and 2012.....
I will remember even your ugliness

A THOUSAND FACES OF TRUTH

Look into my bluest eye
and see the thousand faces of truth
am a beggar, and am the truth
not your sugarcoated statistics
-statistics are human beings
with the tears wiped off

Look into my bluest eye
and see the pain and shame
hidden by the sparkles
and pseudo-smiles
am hurting and hating
yet no one notices

Behind this veil of bliss
are a thousand faces
a thousand faces of truth
a thousand faces bathed in blood
a thousand faces knowing no smiles
a thousand faces of truth

If you ever look into human faces
remove the veil of bliss and watch
take your time to notice the faces
-a thousand faces of truth

Look into my bluest eye
and see
look into my bluest eye
and see a thousand faces
look into my bluest eye
and see a thousand faces of truth
remove the veil of bliss

...AM LIVING MY DREAM...

I won't pierce this sharp knife
through my pith,
won't end my troubled existence
because only I,
understand what I've been through

I thought I was in love-
    before I got this mass
    of extra cells;
    they call it a foetus
-but love is always the reason
for doing dishonourable things
and I was stupid,
I fell victim to his whims,
sweet talk
and careless caresses
then he said I pissed him off
and he dumped me,
he wasted me

There are many like him,
many of his kind,
they don't listen to voices
crying in the wilderness
they pretend not to see
the ceaseless tears,
maimed hearts
and crushed spirits
yet they are the cause
of the ceaseless suffering

To you little one
playing soccer in my belly,
sometimes whistling
a soothing melody,
I know you're innocent
that's why I've chosen to live
to let you live

So I won't pierce this sharp knife
through my pith,
won't end my troubled existence
because only I,
understand what I've been through

He played with my honour
and left me desolate
like a deserted mine,
its richness extracted,
its story forgotten

He left me frigid and frail
and mocked at my being
he said my bones are dry,
they have no life
but these dry bones
will still support my being
they've refused to rot
in the gutter of condemnation

Though they'll think me of no value,
think am a whore, slut, bitch
I' ll still walk proud
and tell my story

I won't pierce this sharp knife
through my pith,
won't pierce this sharp knife
through my throat.....

CLOSER TO THEE!

We want to be closer to your throne
because that's where the gold is
we do everything in your name
your name is a password

Through your name
we open virgins' thighs
we import tax free
and our children never lack

Through your amazing name
we silence our critics
the best professionals
we make rejects

Nubile women
throw themselves at our feet
begging for money, and sex of course
(blessed is he who comes in the name of the leader!!)

That's why we do everything to please you
we listen to no one but you
we crave closeness to no one
but you

Closer to thee
is our song
Closer to thee
is our song

FOR ALL TRUE POETS

Poetry is art itself,
it's a struggle against silence,
it's a struggle against monopoly,
solitude, separation, loneliness...

Poetry is 'I love you'
never whispered to the secretly admired
art says 'I hate you'
but couldn't tell you face-to-face

Art is for the hating and hurting,
the love, condemnation and embrace
poetry is for those who have plunged their depths,
those who have encountered struggle herself,
those who've been hurt
and have said never again
poetry is for never forgetting

Poetry is freedom,
and freedom is to never conform,
conformity is not for poets,
not for my kind,
poetry defies the 'how-to manual'
poetry is art,
art is freedom,
a space within which we define ourselves,
find ourselves
and even...lose ourselves

Poetry is the word,
it is in the word,
within the word
and about the word,
the word spoken, recited and sung,
the word immortalised, sculpted,
painted, illustrated...

The word is life itself,
and life is a strainer of all you give her
art strains, censors the self and others
it builds, destroys and rebuilds

Poets recite, speak and sing
poets write and sing words,
they condemn and embrace...
poets are in a race,
a race in which the prize,
is to know who they are...

I'M A WRITER

As a lone sojourner on the path of life
I have a numbing silence within me,
so much to say but no ear to whisper into
like the little lonely bird
which sings madrigals in the forest
calling on trees to listen at least for once
bu they (trees) keep humming their own tune
so I talk to myself and for myself,
sing to myself and for myself,
I write for myself and my kind
I write soothing verses-a remedy for excruciating pain
in no time at all
my pain is washed away
by the rain,
rain of cathartic verses

I draw for myself from nothing
I paint a portrait of me,
I display the struggles and bitter wars
from within and without
I weave convoluted metaphors
to shield my anger
with a pen and pad
to exorcise bitterness from my mind
I'm a writer
I record the outpouring of my soul

JOE PATERNO

The hero whose picture you see most often may also have the least emotional experience...He is probably uncertain about who he's supposed to be. Inside, he's tender and fragile.

WHAT'S IN A NAME?

In Malawi, we love our culture so much. That is why when the West wants to impose alien practices on us we say “that is against our culture”. Our culture expects us to respect elders, adhere to precepts of good living and be productive citizens. Most importantly, we have to respect Chiefs because they are custodians of our culture.

Talking of Chiefs, there is this Paramount Chief from the Lower Shire. He prides in calling himself a custodian of culture. On a certain single day he does not put on shoes or a shirt. He wraps himself in a red cloth and bare-breasted girls in their adolescence dance for him. Apparently, they do not dance for him but for a spirit of a certain potent priest who died centuries ago. But my question is, if the first person to occupy his throne had owned a shoe would he have conducted these cultural ceremonies barefooted? Anyway, I wouldn’t want to speculate so I leave it at that.

There are also other aspects of our culture which we treasure so much. One of them is the way we conduct our wedding ceremonies. Wedding ceremonies have revealed one trait of people to me: everybody wants to be rich. Even for a fleeting moment. This is evident during wedding ceremonies. A person who wants to give K 500.00 to the bride and groom will split it into K 20.00 units. He or she wants to be seen dropping money into the bowl, tray or whatever container is used to collect the wedding gifts a lot of times. So he or she will drop K 40. 00 and dance for five minutes, come back, drop another K 40. 00 go dancing….until the K 500. 00 is finished. The question is why not just drop the K 500. 00 into the dish at one go? Because then one saves time and energy. You and I know that then his or her wishes will not be fulfilled. He or she wants to be seen as rich, even for a fleeting moment. Everyone wants to be rich.

Weddings have also revealed how we love to dance. Malawians love to dance, especially our women. But Malawian women need to be told the truth. Pure, unadulterated truth. They do not know how to dance. All along we have been hoodwinked into thinking that Malawian women know how to dance. Now that we have satellite television and are able to see how Shakira, Beyonce, Mbilia Bel and others can dance, we know better. Malawian women do not know how to dance! The funny thing about all this is that our women actually think they know how to dance. They are so confident of their dancing prowess to the extent that they have danced for every President that we have had; dancing towards dictatorship in the process. But now that we know better, it is high time we told them that they do not know how to dance. This will make them not to dance for the next person who fate will bestow on our country as President. They will have understood that they do not know how to dance and they will no longer have the confidence to dance towards dictatorship.

Oftentimes am tempted to think that dictatorship is born out of the names we call a leader with. There is something about a person’s name. I met a certain lady and asked what her name was. “Grace”, she replied.

 “Yes, you are Grace; you cannot be Joyce, because you are not behaving like Joyce”.

The point I am driving home is that a person behaves according to his or her name. Madalitso starts to be a blessing to others, Mabvuto always courts trouble. The same holds true for other names. This is why we must be careful when giving names to people. The Ngoni should particularly be careful. They like giving names to our political leaders. They particularly like giving out the name Ngwazi to a person they think has achieved. Linguistically, the name Ngwazi comes from ‘M’gwazi’, meaning ogwaza (somebody who is ruthless). Tchaka the Zulu was a Ngwazi, he was a ‘M’gwazi’, he was ruthless. A hitherto good person starts to be ruthless when given the name Ngwazi. He or she wants to behave according to his or her name. So next time the Ngoni should think again when they want to crown someone Ngwazi.

 I do not want some to conclude that I am discrediting the Ngoni, no, I will never do that. I am of Ngoni descent myself. My late grandmother was from the Mlangeni lineage. In fact, she was just called Namulangeni. Linguists will attest that Na- means child of. So she was a child of Mlangeni. As far as I know the Mlangenis are Ngoni, pure Ngoni. I love Ngoni culture. I particularly love how the Ngoni love drinking. The wife brews beer for her husband and fills his calabash while kneeling. In some Ngoni villages and other villages in Malawi, men and women go drinking together. They smoke together and go to the fields together. A man and his wife go out together to drink at the neighbouring village (common with the elderly folk). They come back together, sniffing their powder and singing songs. In town it is different. A man tells his wife that she cannot go to a bar because women who go to bars are ‘indecent’. But if no decent woman goes to a bar then no decent man should go to a bar. But men insist they are still decent even if they go to bars. The real reason men do not want their wives to accompany them to bars is because they are afraid of losing their freedom to ‘flirt’.

Flirting seems to be the ‘in thing’. It is sweet. In the course of flirting you ‘use and dump’. Politicians want to flirt with us. They want to use and dump us. That is why when we insist that the relationship of ‘Governor’ and ‘governed’ has attendant rights, obligations and duties they try to shut us up. They want to play with our resources in whatever way they can think without being question. But hey, I digressed too much. This was supposed to be about names. Bye for now.    

TRUE LOVE

The greatest salesmen can't sell it
Reputed suppliers don't stock it
You can't find it on their shelves
Code-breakers can't decode it
Academicians can't truthfully research it
Valuers can't value it
Psychiatrists can't psychoanalyse it
No physicist or mathematician has a formula for it
Nor can genetic engineers create it
No inventor can claim intellectual property rights

Dictionaries can't define it
poets can't explain it
nor can painters and songwriters
no magnet can repel it
nor can any force pull it
no laboratory can test it
no plant can assemble it
no gallery displays it
nor does any showroom

Few have expeienced it
Many never will

It is the inexplicable feeling
of the common people
the uncaused cause of compassion
the trigger of goodwill

It is found in the tender touch o mothers,
the comforting voice of fathers,
the ceaseless giggles of infants
and the spontaneous smile of a stranger

It is found in the unsaid words,
whispers and the loud silence
it makes you laugh when there are no jokes
makes one cry tears of joy
its home is a person's heart of hearts

I call it true love

SEARCHING

Searching in the wilderness
For the fountain of strength
The up welling of wisdom
And foothold of wealth

Praying for grace and serenity
To accept my stupidity and change
Change for the better
And never slide back

Wishing to hold
The peace of my own
To be what am supposed to be
To abandon the facade

Trying to save me from myself
Believing in second chance
I can see it from a glance
Let me not blow it

LORD grant me that one chance
Grant me that second chance
Grant me the fat chance
LET me not be prisoner to the past

ALL I WANTED

All I wanted was a chance to be my own,
the peace within me to hold
the beauty around me to behold
stories of hate to be told
and those of love two-fold

All I wanted was a voice to sing my song
let in motion my emotional swansong
my life to be sang louder than a song,
my life, to be a love song
my love, to be a hate song

All I wanted was a tablet to record my history
a repellant to repel my misery
a key to unlock the mystery
insight to discover the treachery
and love, to be my company

All I wanted was a shoulder to cry on
all I wanted was a shoulder to lean on
a strong hand to my own
a strong hand to make me strong
and strong feet to hold the fort

All I wanted was a peace of my own
and I got you!

A lively audience
a sombre audience
holding the trurbulence within your hearts
hiding the hatred boling in your minds
an audience full of faces!

Sad faces, lively faces,
I dare not say ugly faces
coz we're all made in His image

Now I want to compose a thousand stories
stories for those crying within,,
and for those rejoicing too
stories for those who have aborted
and those who have vowed never to
stories for those rejected and abandoned
stories for those accepted and embraced
stories of love and hate
love in the time of zero deficit
love in the time of AIDS

And when the writing is done
am still left with my dream
I still long for the peace of my own
still long for the day when the peace within I'll hold
the beauty around I'll behold
stories of love I'll tell
and those of hate, two-fold
just for you
my audience

TO DIALOGUE, TO LET WORDS BE

What do you want to do?

I want to...
to abandon the monologue
and truthfully dialogue
to reject the loud silence
and embrace the eloquence
to abandon the thinking
and simply be the voice
to stop procastinating
and make my choice
to just....let...words...be

What do you want to do yourself?

To stop worrying
and simply grow
to be nourished
and beautifully glow
to cease violent withdrawal
and let my emotions show
to accept rejection
and never worry at all
to just...let.....words....be

To realise tears are like blood
they only come out
when the duct is burst
to take my time
and never move in haste
be at peace with the self
and happily rest
to...just....let...words...be

To accept the coldness
and hostility
to move with boldness
and turgidity
to achieve wholeness
and full capacity
to listen to the voice of oneness
and serenity
to...just...let...words...be

To move beyond
self-reproach
to mend broken hearts
and wipe the tears
to carry my torch
and light the world
diminish the darkness
and even the fear
to...just...let....words...be

To stumble, tumble
and fumble
to pick myself up,
listen to the fables
and tell tales
to disapprove
and never condemn
to know the prson
behind the name
to...just..let...words...be

A BIRD WITH BROKEN WINGS

I met a bird with broken wings
called her my pink bird
she dropped me when
I wanted to take off

That's when I learned
that birds with broken wings
have broken hearts too,
I embraced a broken heart
and mine got broken too,
it's contagious!

I learned to observe and never condemn
to withdraw and never reclaim
to move on and never look back
most of all, to be careful,
to recognise the pain beneath the smile
the sad stories behind each happy face

I learned to never be cruel
and ask how it is that people manage
to rape the purity of an innocent heart,
to condemn powerless children into suffering?

I cheered a bird with broken wings
I called her my pink bird
she had a broken heart,
broke mine as well!

INDECISION

Indecision!
why do you work
against my ambition?
just let me make my decision,
exercise my volition
and when I do that
collision
of irresistible force
and immovable object is certain!

SELLING, SHAKING, WRITHING

Am a vendor and am selling
my stupidity to the world
am showing my morbid mind
to the world as I've known it
why not?
it's been cruel to me!
it's suppressed,
     oppressed,
     frustrated,
     mutilated, even
     dismembered me
it has forgotten to remember me
I just had to remind it I also exist
am a street vendor
don't tell me about equality
in gender, law, policy, whatever!

Am a free being and I shake
my booty till it resonates
till it makes sound like clanging cymbals
If you strip me naked
you're stripping naked your mama
I've given birth myself you pica-ninny!
Let me walk freely on the streets
let me swing my hips
let me paint my lips
am just expressing myself
if am destroying myself, then let it be!

Am an orphan and am writhing,
crying within
my soul was stabbed
right on the day I was conceived
I have no food to eat
nor place to sleep
into rich homes
I only peep
I pray to the Lord my soul to keep!

Am just a writer holding the pen,
and the pain, too
you also neglect me, it's true,
but Mr Chicken farmer
listen to the voices
your labourers are crying
they are selling,
             shaking,
             writhing
while you enjoy the rhythm!

SOON THEY'LL CONTROL YOUR MIND

I have always believed
that you will come to me
as a butterfly does to a flower


I have always believed
that silence is the best
form of persuasion

But they infiltrated your mind
told you am not your kind
that my advances you shouldn't mind
that the best you are yet to find

You know them
those sons of perdition
they make me fume with trepidation
my lips churn out condemnation
my pen churns out condemnation

Can someone stop the negativity?
may be am foolish in my inactivity

But before you know it
they'll control your activity
before you know it
they'll control your destiny,
you won't break free!