Golden Anniversary

Here are the two poems I wrote for my grandparents on their 50th wedding anniversary. (2008)

SWEET UNION.

Heavens armies smiling upon

Heavens winds blowing upon

As two were holily united

Each said … ‘I do’.

They vowed

Vows as strong as a pebble in water

Vows that gave us life

For they vowed to give us life

Golden years together

Golden hearts together

And not just by luck

The maker of the universe… united.

You have lived to be phenomenons

Pillars of love

Towers of happiness

Sowers of life

Your humility and gentleness

Your kindness and faithfulness

Shall forever be examples

Upon eternity for us all.

With the pace you set for us

We have to succeed

We have reason to be

We have you.

You are our backbone

You influence all our lives

We love you

God loves you.

FIFTY GOLDEN YEARS!

Seconds have turned into minutes

Minutes have turned into immaculate hours

Hours have turned into cherished days

Today it’s been 50 years…golden years!

This world’s dearest gentleman

And the sweetest lady ever

Both gifts of natural love

Gave n’ hazarded all…for us.

Had something been miscalculated

Had one said... "I don’t"

Had one given up along the way

None of us would be.

Risky yet sweet

That all our destinies

Lay with only two

On 9th August 1958

Fifty golden years ago

You lay a foundation

You planted a tree

Today your fruits overflow.

Today is great!

Today is special!

We love you!

We thank you!

SILLY PASSION

A few stolen kisses is all we had.

In the late evenings... at the onset of  night. Like spoilt teenagers seeking a new intrigue, we sneaked behind bushes and around lonely corners like petty thieves.
We'd pretend to have small talk like mature people. Both too shy to make the first move. Each too cautious for a tongue slip. Afraid to betray secret feelings.

How did we meet? 
Like some mindless idlers. 

It was fun. Silly things are usually fun.

I blush every time it crosses my mind.
Recently, I think of you a lot. I often miss those days when I had little in mind... scatter brains. I did not think, I just felt and did. I try to recall a single conversation we might have had, anything we might have said... mmh, Nothing!
I only have memories of what you made me feel.

Still The One

When am far from you

Away from your comforting embrace

In a place you are not

You are still the one I’ll be loving.

The sun scorching hot

Drying up everything it touches

Will dry up all my strength but not my feelings for you

You’re still the one who cools me.

In the night when all is quiet

I’ll be freezing inside

Wishing you would throw your arms around me

You’re still the one that could warm me up.

Birds will chirp every morning

I’ll want to go on sleeping

Nothing to wake up to

You’re still the one I’d rather wake up beside.

Of all the things I’ll be missing

Wishing I’d brought them with me

Longing to have just once more

You’re still the one that tops my list.

Time will drag

Jealous of you and me

Trying to keep us apart

But I will come back to you.

Now and always

You  are  still  the  one!

Black Friday

On Friday the 13th a few months ago, my best friend committed suicide.

She tied one end of a strong wire round her neck and the other to a tree behind her house. No one found her until her vivacious soul had long left the body. The pathetic mess that was her remains showed no resemblance to the luscious beauty she had always being.

The morning of the funeral, her father brought out photographs of her since she had been a baby. We went down that memory lane as we stared at and mourned the bubbly little girl whose smile had always being infectious. Even her smile on the obituary was infectious. She was the prettiest face most of us have seen. We stared through those photos into the heart of this happy little baby and into the person we all remembered her to be. Lisa was a gem.

At midday, her coffin was laid six feet under and the grave was hurriedly filled with earth. Her siblings cried and wailed hysterically. Her mother, long dump-found and immobilized by the shock, could not bare to witness the burial. She stayed in her room crying her heart out. Some of her women friends stayed with her,they of course could not manage to console her enough, but the stayed to watch her. Yes, she needed to be watched in case she (in a fit of insanity) decided to follow her child to the other world.

I peeped and saw her old man wearing a face of courage. But the stammer in his voice when he said his speech betrayed his bruised soul. She had been his first child, the first fruit of his virility. He had sired other children with his wife, all of whom he loved dearly. Still Lisa had always been his bright star. The one who lit his sky in the darkest of nights. She had been his pride. Every morning this civil servant went grudgingly to work, it was just so he would feed his Lisa. The others could eat whatever could be salvaged from the shamba. But his angel had to have the best. What was left to toil for now?

I almost dressed in orange. Or pink. Maybe even luminous green. We both hated black clothes. It was beyond enough that both our skins are the darkest tint of black you could find. Lisa had several times amid in jest said that if her time came before mine, she would like to peep from the yonder world and see me dressed in something colourful for her sendoff. She believed in all things bright. Her favorite colour was the rainbow. I’d also jokingly made her promise she’d wear a sky blue balloon dress should my time come before hers.

How I wished I could take her place and she mine. I know she would have worn my favorite colour for me, for our friendship.

I love life and I like to believe that life loves me back. But for a few moments, as I watched her casket disappear into the ground, I couldn’t help but wish we could swap places. I wore plain mundane black. I wore black from my 3” high heels to the solid stockings to my long nunly dress and veil. I hid myself in black and hated myself for being a bad friend.

I left early. I should have stayed out of respect. I should have stayed to read her eulogy as was scheduled. But I couldn’t bare to stay there. I could feel her disappointed stare prick through my disguised clothing past my pale skin into my conscience. I felt her hate me as her troubled spirit wondered why. So I left. I promised myself that I would be back when I found the answers to all these whys.

Why had I cowardly worn black to her farewell party?

Why had I not read the poem I wrote for her, why hadn’t I read her eulogy?

Why had I killed her?

After I had pulled away from the crowd, I sat at a distance from their gate. I sat at the ‘base’ where teenage boys usually sit to smoke while their parents are away at work. I did not have the courage to go too far.

I remembered meeting Lisa in Campus. Lisa had always been the kind of girl who never cared to please anyone but her overbearing self. Needless to say, I had disliked her at first. I had gossiped her and her click for most of first year. But in the second year of campus, we got the same room. I instantly thought of moving out but I had no where else to go since most rooms in campus were taken already. But in less than a week of being roommates, we discovered that we had so much in common. And as Alaine sings, we discovered that what tears us apart is what brings us back together. We had disliked each other because that’s what bitchy girls in rival cliques do. But we were in essence, mirror images of each other.

I sat reminiscing over the many week nights we‘d stayed up all night chitchatting and gossiping. We watched only a few movies but sang to almost every song. We both knew every popular song, and the unpopular ones too. I slyly smiled at the memory of all those afternoons we gossiped and made noise in class. A few times we’d been thrown out together. I reminisced the numerous times Lisa and I had been out raving. The countless times we slept through morning class because we’d had one too many the previous night. The mwakenyas we wrote on our laps the morning of an exam, because we’d been too busy raving all semester to read a thing.

Lisa and I had friends. Tons of friends. Female friends and male friends. Real friends and pretentious friends. Straight friends and gay friends. Lover-friends and just-friends. She was gone and they offered me a shoulder to cry on. Some of them called me at three in the morning to say that I shouldn’t worry much, that it would be alright. They still loved her, but I doubted they still would when they found out why she’d decided to kill herself.

They were bound to find out. And they would blame me.

Breaking

I have been heartbroken. I have had a hole the size of a small country bored through my heart. I have been knocked out silly. It’s devastating. But I’ve pulled through.


I remember my healing process.

My heart healing felt like the aftermath of a volcanic eruption. I felt a blistering larva boil over, some flowing southwards to upset my stomach. After settling in, I felt it begin to cool. I could feel myself coagulate. It happened fast, like I had been placed inside a huge freezer.  I felt all softness wash away and instead, a pounding rock formed.

I have never been weak. Right from childhood, I have been strong-headed and tough. I was never a love-struck teenager. In fact, all through puberty, I thought boys were dippy and dubiously cheeky. Long story short ... I didn’t have a boyfriend until I was of legal age. And I didn’t think much of it. My ideas of love were never in the standard ‘Cinderella and the prince’ form. I simply thought that was fool’s gold. I didn’t believe in ‘knights in shining armour’. Quite the opposite! I didn’t dig the polished type. Well, that’s what I thought then. Now I may think a smart, groomed man in a tie is absolutely ravishing. But back then, I though a some level of unkempt roughness was essential in a man.

I eventually did fall head over heels in love, a couple times. The stories of how my scrawny little heart got broken, mend and broken again aren’t novel really. I think it is for weaklings to tell of getting their hearts broken. I boast of my scars. I think they show that I’ve lived and loved. I’m a proud woman. I don’t lick my wounds; instead, I turn to philosophy (read cliché quotes) for consolation.

I was surprised that I could be overpowered by frail feelings alike a love-struck teenager. I found it baffling I had begun crying myself to sleep. I felt foolish, but I didn’t stop drenching my pillow. Actually, I made a habit of it. Not that anyone could tell. We grown ass women know how not to wear our true emotions on our shoulders. After weeping all night, we apply powder to conceal our swollen faces and we dash bright lipstick to steal any attention from our bloodshot eyes.




 
Then I healed.

Yes, that’s what this is about. I healed.


And I didn’t like it. I could feel myself become somewhat vile. As the larva condensed and took solid form, I could feel that I wasn’t going to be malleable. I was sure I’d be a carnivore. I felt an unquenchable thirst build up. I was ready to break a few hearts (OK, more than just a few).

Cursed Dice

There was a boy I liked once

And he was wondrous silly

He for a fool took me

With my heart gambled he

But alike a dice cursed

Luck turned sour upon him

And in love with me fell he

Till he couldn’t bear watch

When my bags I packed and trekked

With poison laced upon fruit

His soul he set to wander hades

Spirit of dawn

Early in the morn’
Singer birds yet to rise
The dew wet on the grass.

I open up for you
Chase the ghouls
Their dark dwell is flown.

I want to see you
A whiff of a weak dwindling spirit
Appear only slightly.

I hear you whirl in the wind
First, you whisper a scary note
Then you blow a soothing calm.

As you sway like a dancer
Let me feel you brush past
Shake a tree and drop me a leaf.

Sis'

                       You are my sister
                       Child of my father
                        Daughter of my mother
                        Blood of my blood.


                        We played together as kids
                        Shared a lot in our childhood
                        We still make nasty jokes at each other
                        We singsong late in the night.


                        When am scared of the dark
                        Or hurting deep within
                        I can always crawl into your bed
                        I know am welcome, we are sisters!
       

                        There are times you make me happy
                        These times I sing you praise
                        I’m in a parting mood
                        I’m glad we are sisters.


                        Sometimes you make me angry
                        Then, I want to smash you into pulp
                        You are talented at irritating me
                        I wonder why we had to be related.


                         Many times you make me proud
                        You are the jewel of our race
                        I want to be associated with you
                       I beat my chest and boast for you.


                        There are moments when am lost
                        I go the wrong path
                       And do the silly-est of things
                       You un-falteringly point me to the right direction.


                        Sometimes am embarrassed to be called your siz
                        Maybe I’ve offended and shamed our people
                        But you always love me
                        You still call me your sister.


                        Other times I feel empty and lonely
                        That the world is against me
                       I feel unwanted and be-littled
                        But you hold my hand…give me strength.

***************

DANCING ON THE MOON

When I am with you

Just walking and chatting

Enjoying each others company

My heart dances on the moon.

When you hold me in your arms

Very close to your heart

And I feel your breathe on my forehead

My soul dances on the moon.

Whenever am far from you

I get very lonely

And I really need you

Take me dancing on the moon.

Whenever my phone rings

And your name shows on my screen

My heart jumps in excitement

And I’m dancing on the moon.

When late at night I lay

In bed thinking of you

And fantasize of our love

I’m dancing on the moon.

Whenever I think of you

Being with someone else

fear I would lose you

And never again dance on the moon.

Stay with me love

Hold me for eternity

And love me always

So I shall forever dance on the moon.