Future Things

The winds of the past
have come to lick our
dried bones
The trumpets have
already been blown;
the thorns laid in our path
For the excruciating pain to come was foretold:
the burning sun and the overflown seas,
air yet breathless, water and not drink

The Rulers have heard and not heeded
And time would not credit to any being!
Would our sufferance be such unseen?

In the Gulf

Not all things true are born best
So love grows in strife, even it heckled
like a mother bird at days end
comes to its nest
to watch and groom its young with bitter patience
So does love thrive slowly in the long wait
like an empire
Ever growing in temptation--of damning mutiny
to break and fall

Finally rewarding

Portrait

Should i run--or would you i fly
to the mountain
To pluck you the flower edelweiss?
I'm not certain it smells better than you
But you beckon and I'll make the Abraham-Isaac journey
Because you, milady, you rule.

Simple. Do not ask the éclat that made me you
You are fair, my dark Lady.
Your edification is not of the
lecturer's master stroke

Beauty has a Price

Beauty has a price!
The many minds and eyes it steals from;
A boisterous bilk unspoken of
That made fortune of
those that seek her to shine
A bond which can keep you
slave as your end is nigh
The attachments so perilous

For Beauty flees when needed most!

Unfinished Lines for Tomorrow

Quiet. Silent. That is what I
have been,
is
and to become. . .
But it is a cloud under
which you veil your grace. . .
and more. . .

Eli Forces a Poem

There's a wretch'd soul
out in the cold
Homeless and with no place
of abode
A white angel comes but
says hello. . .
So the street kid pleads to
man and anchor's hope on
the being above.
He says: Let us be bad in the dark,
men sad and god glad!

Torches that Burnt with Childly Tears

Every man bears his god load
I have been told our people
don't pass a father's
lingering evil
Onto the innocent son!

Still this earth has seen
under the fiery eyes of the sun
Senseless judgments slapped on my face
For my brother's sake; and my poor race
And i'm a naked child
playing in the sun;
Suppressed to hide its rays
as clouds cover
But a while, the radiance of day
The theft of light which
makes me cold where i lay
A produce of men with
thick dark hearts
Laying thorns on jolly paths;
Places where lads like I tread
In our only gaiety as per
our state should be blest
Yet in this ancient promise
of the lamb we await
For holders of our key on
earth from their slumber
awake
Till heaven shows sigh at
our demise!

Tamale Fragmented Together

Cadbury had deserted,
divorced Tamale
And in its stead is the red,
hot sands:
The frowning terracotta.

A wicked bride that borne dirt, childless
But Tamale is a strange
person.
A husband that cares not
to wipe the dusty face of
the weary woman.
If he reneged on his vows,
let him pay the restitution

Yet, in all this, Tamale's
unborn seeds are bright,
brimming with love for self
and others. The hope to
become better fathers.

These lads are in contest
for the Queen's tongue.
The ultimate prize: A mere
smile for saying words
of the Oppressor
But here, the bicycle owns
the streets and man must
bow to her majesty

28 February, 2008. UDS, Tamale