Would You Mind?

Would you mind if we split up your salary
As I, a poet, wrote for you pieces you love?

Would you mind if I stayed in your house
Just drinking from the licit brew of my intoxication?

Would you mind, friend, if I woke you up at 2 a.m.
To tell you that Cummings spoke to me in a dream?

If I took you to the fields and asked you if the air
Is a little sulky and withdrawn, would you mind?

Would you mind, friend, if I read you my free verses
In a busy lane without a care, shouting like a man possessed?

If I kept silent, just listening to my loud thoughts
Or perhaps burst out laughing, would you mind?

If I whistled deep into the night, just to hear my voice
And with equal measure tapped my feet, would you mind?

If I invited you to see the cactus and thorns on a hot day
Without use of your jalopy, would you mind?

Would you mind friend, if I played Zilizopendwa* in your Sony
And hummed along with Daudi Kabaka's Pole Musa?

Would you mind, if in my eccentricity, I followed up a spider
Into your attic, because it is a subject of my poem?

Would you mind, friend, if I kept my poetry books in your cabinet
And flicked on channels for my favourite poets?

If I talked with your pet, laughing with him and teach him
A thing or two about survival, would you mind?

Friend, would you mind if I stopped a little while longer
To chat with a mad man, just to keep up with him?

Would you mind, friend, if I stared into the dying sun
While listening to Sundowner, feeding on its last glory?

Would you mind if we lived on your fat salary
While I keep to necessities, as long as I can breath?

Would you mind my lifestyle, my oddity, my queerness
Amidst your standard regulated life?

Would you accommodate me, friend
With all my imperfections and anomaly?

* Zilizopendwa-- Those old music common with the old folks
Daudi Kabaka-- An iconic musician of Kenya who passed away; Pole Musa is one of his songs


C) Lorot Salem 2011

Telegram From The Dead

                                             

                                                                               Space
                                                                      Dangerous heights
                                                                                Thud
                                                                         Scattered limbs

                                                                              Spiral to
                                                                               abyss
                                                                        Crimson blood

                                                                              Muffled
                                                                               Sobs
                                                                               Gash

                                                                                Sirens
                                                                          Ambulances.
                                           


                                                                      ~ Lorot Salem 2011

Let Us Draw a Sketch, You and I

Let us then draw a sketch, you and I,
Of a blueprint of what our minds chart

Draw close, put these thoughts,
Paint them anew, make them real

Let us get lost in this moment,
Let us be poised to tomorrow

Never be shackled, let our minds be free
Let them intrude into the dawn unknown

Let us immortalize these, you and I
Because oft great ideas are shy and soon scamper

Let us forget this moment, the pain and reality
Let us envision ourselves soaring with the eagles

Let us then draw a sketch, you and I
Of that very eagle

Imagine us flapping those wings, the endless skies
Buildings like toys, monuments like grains

Imagine us in that freeing wind
Gliding, diving in phantom heights

Now, let us draw the sketch, you and I
Let us be the eagle

Worry not of the fate of Icarus and Daedulus
We are not even in the clouds, first things first

After finishing the sketch,
Let us look back and cogitate

Tomorrow, you and I,
we will be that eagle.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Kacheliba Hill

Kinsman, when I look at Kacheliba Hill*
My eyes cloud, my heart putters

Suppressed joy escapes my lips
I shout gratitude in the tongue of my people

Why, this Hill stands tall
Watching us below, aware of its sacred duty

It towers magnificently, detached
Leaving Lomalaya* and Shabaha* in pet rivalry

Oh, Kacheliba Hill, you are the umpire
Never judgmental, you know all the secrets

You feed the monkeys with mkwaju*
The hyraxes hide in your bosom

Eywei*, even lotiriri* sit on your head
You don't mind its whirring engine

In the ways of our people, I need to say thank you
May be with a gourd of sour milk and sorghum

But how do I do? Should I pour it on your peak
Or at the foothills?

Should I do it at daytime
Or at night?

You are wise, of that I admit
You don't burble, you don't gabble

Of those prattles of the wind
You choose to ignore in your sagacity

We all rever you, even in jest
We don't swear by your name

When I was young, I wrote my name
On your skin; I wanted you to remember me

I called out my name to you, you repeated that
Exactly like my voice; we remain comrades

Stand tall, stand magnificent
O Kacheliba Hill; always remain true



C) Lorot Salem 2011
**********************

Kacheliba Hill-- A defining geographical feature in Kacheliba, Kenya.


 Lomalaya-- A small hill in kacheliba; Also, Shabaha.


 Mkwaju-- A Kiswahili term for tamarind.


Eywei-- A Pokot word used to express sadness, sympathy, pity.


Lotiriri-- A Pokot word for an aeroplane.

February 1984

( This poem is an elegy to the 5,000* people who were killed on February 1984 in what is commonly referred to as the Wagalla Massacre. This is their story, these are their voices.)

I am a ghost in your conscience
Gnawing at your beleaguered mind
Screaming not in graveyard
But expanse of nothingness;
I am a haunted ghost.

I am the shame in your heart
That no amount of soul-searching will cleanse
I am the dirt, the forgotten stain
Dotting your fabric.

I am a roving spirit in Tarbaj, Leheley,
Wajir-Bor, Khoraf Harar, Bulla Jogoo
Wagalla Airstrip;
I refuse to settle, tormented is my phantom.

I walk in broken steps, head bowed,
Carrying the shame of my corrupted tale
Desert heat carrying the stench of my death
The wind carrying the dirge in my breast.

We are a legion spirits
Of ruptured brains, cindered bodies, rotten flesh
We carry the laceration of our raped bodies
On our backs are canvasses of mad artists
Our scars tell a story, we need not say it.

Our spirits have those images:
Naked bodies on hot gravel, gun shots
Last rigours of bodies clawing at life
Perfect job, clean work.

We are a story that will not die
You may obliterate us
You may extirpate what happened
But our kindred spirits
Will be the story.

I often wonder the symbolism it brings
Annihilation at an airstrip:
To never allow dreams take off?
To keep us back to the penury of the ground?

Sometimes as spirits we often laugh
At the sense of humour: Of watching you rape our wives,
make us drink our urine, then scatter our brains
Now, those are the ingredients of a good horror movie.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Poet's Note:

* The official government position has been that only 57 people were killed during the Wagalla Massacre. However, others put the figure at 5,000.

In preparation to write this poem, I had to read a couple of materials including Wagalla Massacre: The Untold Story, Blood on the Runway: The Wagalla Massacre of 1984 by S. Abdi Sheikh.

As the author writes: "The Wagalla Massacre story has every bit of a horror movie; blood and scattered brains, severed limbs, rotting flesh and mass graves".

The pain that these people went through was heart-rending, if we are to go by the accounts. They were told to lie down on their chests on the hot tarmac. Those who disobeyed were shot, others died of heat exhaustion. Others were showered with petrol and set ablaze.

Why I Write

I write to free my heart and mind, sustain my sanity
Clustered ideas throng my cranium, legion emotions surge
Voices becloud me, writing them extracts meaning

I write to speak to man, I write to be human
To convey blossoming buds, to apprise caged spirits
To sing of his merriment, to mourn his sorrow

I write to speak from my soul's depths, to reveal my substance
To share my sacred thoughts, to expose my foibles
My eccentricities and idiosyncrasies, my flaws

I write for no reason, I write for no cause
I rummage through my mind, most times at odd places and times
Stumbling upon undecided thoughts, arresting them into meaning
 
I write because words are the only things I have
I can mock kings, I can soothe a tiger
I can paint, I can create--just like God!

C) Lorot Salem 2011

God Recites a Poem ( Part 2)

(Continued from Part 1)

In my poetry, I need no audience
For I can be my own audience
I seek no man's approbation nor appraisal
I am God, I don't move with emotions

I need no experience
I need no reward
If I write I write, once writ no one unwrites
For I am Alpha and Omega, The First and the Last
Time is me, experience is under my feet

I am El-Gibhor, the Mighty God
For I can roar as thunder and whisper in the winds
I can lift the poor and humble the wealthiest
I can speak now and echo throughout eternity
My voice has no limit, I don't have a voice-box
For I am the voice, voice is under my feet

I fit no description, I am indescribable
Yet my facet is known throughout the ages
Of my mercy, my righteousness, my holiness
Men speak my story, I need no story-telling
For even storytelling is me, storytelling is under my feet

I am God, the Creator
I speak and create, I can create and destroy
I can even destroy what is already destroyed
For I can create what has not been created
I can lift a village into a city and bring down empires
At one fell swoop
For creation and destruction are under my feet


Jehovah-Shalom is my name, The Lord of Peace,
I can calm turbulent waters, I can pacify raged hearts
I can send a dove to the mind of a killer, I can conciliate
I can mollify, I can placate
For peace is me, placating is under my feet

I suffer no depression, mortification is not me
I never tire, exhaustion is not me
I never sleep, lethargy is not me
I need no holiday, recess is for my creation
I am God, the Inexhaustible

C) Lorot Salem 2011

God Recites a Poem ( Part 1)

I am God, I share no name with mortals,
I am Elohim, God the Creater and Transcendent
I am El Shaddai, God All Sufficient

In the beginning even before beginning
was beginning I was there;
For I can't be measured by time
For I am El- Olam, the Everlasting God

I am God, the Indescribable One
For I don't fit into the tongue of man
I defy his lexicon for I am the lexicon
Words are under me

Jehovah- M'kaddesh is my name,
The Lord Who Sanctifies
I am holy, delight is mine for righteous souls
Chagrin fills me for the unrighteous


I am God, the Invisible One
You can't paint me on a canvas
Yet I take a walk in Exhibitions
And marvel at your works

I am God, a poet
In fact the greatest poet in heaven and earth
( Heaven and earth? Nay, without limitation of time and space)
I need no script to write my verses and proses
I need no inspiration
I need no style
I suffer no writer's block

My poems are not enclosed in books
They are in the lips of man my creation
They are in the beaks of birds my creation
They are in the tides and waves
Morning dews
Nightingales.

My poems need no review nor critique
For they are just that: Classicals
You see them everyday on the face of a stranger
A talented man walking on tight rope
You see it on a child's face
You see it as the wind blows on a grassy field
Those are my poems, those are my classicals

I am God, I am the Everlasting Poet.
The Bard,  The Sonnetist, The Ace Rhapsodist.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

These Hands

In these shrivelled bony hands, young man,
lie the years of my life
their pulses, their warmth
of times past, many years ago

these hands used to be agile
firm handshakes, steady grip, cosy cuddle
but now limp with age
cold. shaky. lifeless

these hands, young man
once flowed with warm blood
alert nerves
nimble fingers
dexterous

don't be deceived by colour, dear young man
these hands once had the whitest fingernails
now torn, weatherbeaten
(who said age ain't nothing but a number?)

these hands could clap too, dear young man
these very hands
these hands could lift metals and sacks
when these hands were hands

young man, I envy you,
nay, I envy your hands
I can feel their pulses, blood flowing
fingers coursing, you can even pull a fist!

so why then are your hands without emotion?
why the metallic handshakes?
why the undecided clasp?

tell me, dear young man,
why are your hands frail in their youth?
where is life in those hands?
whence went pride in beautiful hands?

O tell me, my young son,
how those hands will be in old age
if they can't lift metals and sacks now.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Chemistry Without Formulae

In a tight clandestine circle they perch
Surreptitiously mumbling incantations
Mumbo-jumbo-abracadabra of a dead ancestor
Lips quiver, heads like geckos move in tandem
Rising and falling, rising and falling
Following some unwritten script

From afar, the bonfire rages on
Offals of a slaughtered black bull are broadcast
To the East where the sun rises, and to the West where ancestors sleep
More  ala kazam, more rise and fall of head
Enfeebled men warble to charm the spirits

"Peace upon the land, if one of you, our forefathers
Is displeased, partake of this libation.
Hold back the rays of the sun against our bald heads
If you let showers, let them not fall like roofs of huts
If we plant sorghum, don't shame us with drought
If any one has offended you, we ask for forgiveness"

One old man reads the offals
Of topography and rivers, of lucks and dangers
Just like a palm-reader!

Atop the raging river, feet are washed
To cleanse the land. A rebirth.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

The Unfinished Conversation

"The Error of your ways, O you lesser mortals!"

He scorns me, his eyes burning on my face

"What quick tongue you have, O sly craftsman!"

I sit, clammed up, unable to respond,

Whenceupon he looks at the hills, bearing dark clouds

rumbles being heard from afar, the land tight with expectations.

"What say thou, if I may ask,

for such an iniquity, for such a transgression?

speak, mortal man, speak"

My mind is numbed, my throat is parched

The raindrops. The patter. Flowing stream.

"Speak, let the rain wash away and cleanse 

the land. Unchain your mind, let your tongue speak

ethos or anathema for it to be washed by the flowing stream;

Now SPEAK!"

Upon which I ventured:

"What should I say, if not what will

Stir the hornet's nest:

What shall I say of myself in your presence

If not stoking the embers of your wrath?"

It rained ever more. I saw flowing debris flowing by,

Torrent, deluge

I lifted my eyes to beseech,

But he was gone!

C) Lorot Salem 2011

We Hold These Truths To Be Self-Evident

We hold these truths to be self-evident
that all men and women are created equal
that both are endowed with certain inalienable rights
that among these are unencumbered hearts, body and soul

We affirm that no man should raise an arm
Be it in malice, misdirected anger or chauvinism
Against a woman
that history has writ that no battles
no victory
no fair judgment was cast
on a society that butchered women souls

We affirm that in the nature of things
that man could chase an animal into a river
that man could jump a building to capture a ruffian
that man could scale a wall to fix a window pane
that women could walk unharmed in raging battlefields
that women were never intended to be objects of hate
that women were designed to create peace

In light of these, this declaration is hereby made
on this 11th of February  in the  year of our Lord 2011
that all men and women are created equal
that our laws will punish a man who maims or kills a woman, imagines,
or acts in a manner to suggest that he intends to do so and all other
intentions or acts not captured here.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Never Be Shaken, Mortal Man

Mortal Man, rise from the dust

We have seen cindered ashes moulded to claypot

We have seen ungrammatical proses

Skid to glory

Rise up, Mortal Man,

I can see you star twinkling

So bright other stars complaining

You may not see it now

I can see it up in the galaxy

Hitch your wagon to the Horizons, Mortal Man

We have seen nondescript elements claim glory

For they remain true as a needle

Rise up.

Never be shaken.

Never forget to dust up.

Even the great had a sad story of struggle.

Mortal Man, Rise up

If some believed that a star could hang on a mountain cap

If some saw a skycrapper galloping down the streets

Who told you that success is impossible?

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Living on Borrowed Breaths

Image credit: google

They squirm in desolation, afraid to breath,
Many a careless exhalation have travelled unguarded
To the walled residences, embarrassing their stature

Thus they live on borrowed breaths
Neither inhaling nor exhaling
Drawing sketches of beautiful lands
In their minds
Lest they be executed
For stealing Picasso's paint brush

They have also learned to dream
Silently
Lest they be accused of
Harbouring Coup d'etat propensities

They walk with stooped shoulders
Lest they be tortured
For appearing brazen

They have learned to nail their thoughts
To mundane things like grocery and the sun
For many a careless exhalation travelled unguarded
To walled residences.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Shared with Jingle Poetry Potluck Week 33

God's Love

If I stood on a mountain
Peered to humanity sprawled on the expanse of earth
Small beings like rice grains on paper moving about
Wind howling into my ears
I would see God.

If I sat and reminisced long enough
Thought of the sun kissing my neck
Or the earth carrying my weight
Or the firmament and the galaxy
I would think love of God.

When I grope in my mind
Shuttling between Egypt's civilization and Now
Weaving words
Creating, uncreating just like God
Chatting with Shakespeare and Nature
I think love of God.

Methinks such love
is an Official Top See-Great
We see it in the eyes of a deranged man
Composed
We feel it when we chat in the streets
We even see it on petals!

C) Lorot Salem 2011

A Neighbour Stole My Sufuria Today

Today my neighbour stole my cooking pot
at the fireplace
My ugali* was still cooking.

I sat back
I mused this:
"Well, Kinsman, if a monkey shook
all the tamarinds in the tree then it is a fool;
but pray, what if it ate one at a time?"

I forgave my kinsman
As good neighbours do.

From the rusty hole of my shack
I saw children chasing each other
One carried a sufuria*

From my ear-shot, Kinsman,
I heard one child scream for ugali scrappings
From my own cooking pot.

From my shack
I sat and thought.
I had lost my appetite.

*Sufuria--A Kiswahili term for a cooking pot
*Ugali--A kind of sticky meal, thicker than porridge, made out of flour

C) Lorot Salem 2011

We Are Such Men

We are such men that thought is distilled
we refine roaming muses
arrest them in our faculties
till reason outs.

we are such men
seated at the edge of time
thinking far-wrought ideas
that goblins and elves
are featured

you never hear of us
invisible we are
for you will pass us
trying to look for
our names in door plates

we are such men
minds sprawled a century into the future
conceiving man in an age so different from now
where bluetooth will download another's mind
where you can shake a newcaster's hand from the telly

we are such men
minds hitched eons into the Beginning
Of past civilizations before Word existed

we are such men
blessed with intellect fizzing with ideas
we are such men, we are such minds.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

If I Could

If I could clasp at the hand of time

I would freeze it at this moment

Wedge it in-between our palpitating hearts

Oblivious to the cacophony without

If I could hypnotize the moon

I would draw its magnificent rays

To light crooked shadows

Of cracked walls and forgotten footpaths

If I could entrance the love goddesses

I would gather Eros, Cupid and Venus

I would charm Isis, Ishtar and Aphrodite

To feed us with ambrosia and

Aphrodisiac

If I could say my wish

It could be to flee with you to the Maldives and

Pantai Pasir Hitam

Sit in Beachfront Deluxe

Inhale  tropical sea breeze

See ancient fishing jetty ourselves

Sprawled in the black sand

But here, my earth goddess,

Under the shade of our oron tree

We will sit on dusty sand and talk

Talk about egrets and elephants

And uuhhhm- Us.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Teach Me Again How To Love

Teach me again how to love, dear son
Teach me again how to love without resistance
Show me how they do it son
How you actually do it, my son

Son, I once loved
Without restraint
Bought roses and cards
Called nth times a day and night
Skipped a heartbeat when my love
inched close to me

I once loved, dear son,
Penned the loveliest poems a man could write
Spruced with imagery
Personified by Cupid
Styled in the most astute devices that
poetry had not invented

But all that is gone, son.
So teach me how to love again, my son
To love and never imagine hurt past gone
To love as if love is a river flowing to eternity

Teach me again how to love, my son
Show me the excitement I once had of love
Spurting in my heart
Teach me again how to love.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Legal Poems Worth Mention

The List Will be Endless

1. Law Like Love by WH Auden

2.The Law My Calling Is by Sir John Davies

3. The Lawyers Know Too Much by Carl August Sandburg

4. They Do Not Understand by Hilary Peplar