Honoured

My good friend Andy has honoured me with an award. That was an uplifting comment from you on your blog. The link is here May Tororot, the God of the Rising Sun continue to stock creativity into your mind and add more life into your years.

Sincerely,
Salem Lorot "Lorot Son of the Hills"

When…

When we let our thoughts soar with the eagles

When we envision a horse gallop on a lake

When we can scrape at misery and hurl it

When we can still our thoughts

When we can paint darkness

When we can paint lightness

When we can fathom the unfathomable

When we can bring characters to life

When we can create suspense

When we can speak our deepest thoughts

When we can reveal our silliest follies

When we can rise above mediocrity

When we can learn of virtues

When we can see a rainbow in the skies

When we can see ourselves in another’s eyes

Only then will we be free.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

For a prompt by Poets United Thursday Think Tank #55 Freedom

Answer Me, Dear Writer

You who create words, tell me

What is the use of the space bar in your keyboard?

When you hit that key almost with irritating certainty

Don’t you realize that you create destitutes?

Why should you stir division and call it elegance?

C) Lorot Salem 2011

For a prompt by Poets United Thursday Think Tank #57 Loneliness

Inside a Night-Time Poetry Journal

As the cow-bells draw near

The golden sunset rays arcing

Darkness fast approaching

Old men trudge past hurriedly

Women with sacks on their backs walk fast

Soon, the fireplace is lit

The smoke-filled hut resurrects

Children play with moths

As mothers adeptly cook ugali

While milking cows at the cowshed

Laughter abounds

Of the cleverness of the hare

Or the gullibility of the elephant

And as the merry floats into the night

It mixes with the howl of the winds

Perhaps as a befitting valedictory

To the wonder of the African night

C) Lorot Salem 2011

From a prompt by Poets United Thursday Think Tank #58 Nightime

A Bleeding Poem (Audio)

                       I

Poem bleeding, seeping, trickling

With blood, raw emotions most blunt

Is what I write, parading it to fight

Poem protesting, projecting, most

Frightening, faceless, decapitated

Amputated, crying out in the depths

Of hollowness, sutured, unsecured

Most obscured, uncured is the poem

I write

See, wrote I perfumed palaces

Blind to all its fallacies, furnished

Chandeliers, shrubbery, lawns

Everything the rich could own

But that poem bled still

Steel is not what made it

Twas like a dog’s heart transplanted

To a rhino’s—serenity amidst inferno!

Wrote I everything picturesque

The mountains, the fountains, the landscape

But what for?

Of hypocrisy, heresy, lunacy?

What for?

Of dilly-dallying, molly-coddling?

What for?

Of damage? haemorrage?

                     II

So ghastly an image

A bleeding poem, fractured stanzas,

Sprained meter, bloodied rhymes

Sombre, sad like October,

Severed, feared

Air scented with antiseptic

Etherized, pungent

Like an adulterated detergent

Abused agent

Unwashed gent

Formless, soulless, heartless

A bleeding poem, screaming at them

Hollering, venting, not circumventing

Pointing, needs no anointing

If you are allergic to horror

Why then do you put up with terror

Stare at the gnarled form

Electrocuted in the fiery storm

Gaze at the faze, chase the gauze

Keep guessing, it is death amazing

                  III

In the circle of death

Mortality spins round and round

Most profound, chaos is the High Priest

Debris is the shrine, bilge is the paraphernalia

Inter alia, mania let loose, fear on noose

Tweedle little human flesh

Perforated, peppered

Served on the altar of human greed

For our cannibal taste buds, we agreed?

Why are you horrified then?

Bon appétit

                 IV

Why are you horrified?

A bleeding poem, in a bleeding world

With a bleeding inspiration, for a bleeding

Motivation, Peel off the gloves

Unmask yourself, smell the blood

Raw wound wasn’t bad like a rotten one

This is the real thing, some sterner musing

Sorry folks, I forgot to warn

Of cadavers, blood and death

You see, we don’t plan collapsing bridges

Or the spurting blood

Do we?

Forgive me if I am being bold

Bleeding poems haven’t been told

Until they flooded our doorsteps

Or the rancid smell of decompose floated

Sorry, death is not fixture to be slotted

                      V

Had I wanted, I would have been blind

Blind to the blight, refuse to look at the paint

Hard enough, enough to notice the dark theme

Had I wanted, I would have painted my own

Canvass, revealing Africa in all its glory

But I keep on seeing elements of its gory

I would have painted the Maasai

The wildebeest and other beasts

But sorry, my creativity bore me to

The Maasai pushed off the cliff

The Wildebeest unmotivated, lives most stiff

C’mon, don’t frown, I am not a clown

If I were posturing, telepathy I would not be conjuring

Had I wanted, I would paint the glory of the African Sun

In all its shades, even when to the West it fades

I would mimic the laugh of the hyena

You would cup your ears

                       VI

But I ask, why do we bask

In the sun we are most clueless?

Shouldn’t we, rather, grope in the darkness

With a hope of light, even with sadness?

What ray should we illuminate

If we can’t fulminate?

How are dark things illuminated

If before time they are eliminated?

How does blood trickle

If they are with chemicals made fickle?

What is a heart most enduring

If it is shielded from the sun most searing?

How will a bleeding heart clot

If it is hid in the furnace of suppressed emotions unfought?

                       VII

Poem bleeding, seeping, trickling

With blood, raw emotions most blunt

Is what I write, parading it to fight

All you need is a toolkit

This is no child skit

Hemorrhage is no sleepwalker oddsey

It is no fantasy

C’mon, uncover the jetting blood

Stop the spill, save your stunt

Harangue later, don’t harass

I am also harassed, the pain, the shame

The blame, the game

I could also want to be a spectator,

Or rather be a commentator

But what for? How do we talk of

Swabbed wounds? How do we describe

The pain we don’t ascribe?

Which expertise do we merit

If not what we claim to inherit?

Or isn’t it blood and all

After all, a free for all?

                      VIII

So let the bleeding poem be

Crawling stench of soul’s morgue

Embalmed, uncalmed, uncharmed

Let the bleeding poem be

Let it mix with our artificial colognes

Hypocrisy! The air is thick with death, bloke

If I were you, I would heal the wound

Protect the scar, leap in fright from afar

I would keep my soft spot close with me

Not exposing them to life’s weird talons

But then, go on, peel of the scar

Let it bleed anew, perforate it

Nib it, tuck it, go on…

Let that pain sting

Is it as fresh as the cologne?

Is it more immediate?

More urgent?

How does it stir you?

Because you are bleeding, huh?

                  IX

That pain is the bleeding poem

Because it bleeds, it heals

Because it heals, it shields

Because it shields, it shrills

Because it shrills, it stills

Bleeding poem is what I write

Bleeding poem is what I parade to fight.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Diatribe to the Dying Tribe

So you are incensed, miffed because

I told you that I am incensed, miffed

By the state of the world, dreams incinerated

Never to smoke, hope choked

Never to flame, ambitions wilted

Never to blossom

And what did you say?

That I am being judgmental, a cynic

A soothsayer, a prophet of doom

For in my shady lens, I see blurred

Sketches of man’s imperfections

Rather than the ‘bigger picture’

Of man’s triumphs

I told you man’s shine

Shouldn’t be dimmed by frail moonlight shadows

That litter man’s galaxy of success

For what is a meteor’s dazzle

If after a minute of spectacle it fizzles?

What is the essence of the sun

If not to bring morning to man’s night of doom?

And what did you say, friend?

That I talked ‘abstract’ and needed

Something ‘immediate’ and ‘real’

That I was being more philosophical than

The Platos and Socrates

And to be immediate

I told you that you are an intellectual

Midget, phobic of learning, a stranded

Soul in a crowd of probing minds,

Thus, in a defeatist spirit,

You cry ‘abstract’ yet all else fits

I didn’t mean to be rude, friend

If I projected myself as such, I request

For your apology, but still

How do you speak of liberation

If you have no clue of Maji Maji and Mau Mau?

If you should talk, peel off your tribal skin

Tell me about the ocean’s tides

How it rises in tandem with man’s kites

Speak with wisdom, entrance me

Tell me about the world in 2072

Not some cheap gossips about witchhunting

That is not new, capture my imagination

With a novel idea, an idea that will save

The planet, not them-and- us cocoon

And so, to incriminate me,

You contorted my noble thoughts

Twisted them to paint me as the bad guy

Assassinated my character

Berated me, besmirched me, bespattered me

But in your bones, you know

That your life has been a lie—

A counterfeit contraband

You also know that

My thoughts stain your conscience

Because I speak from nature

I don’t build gabions in deserts

I don’t breathe helium in theatres

And so, mistakenly,

For every quadruple of accusations

You heap on me, nature throws a dozen

Of alibis, like a dove I shrug them off

Because your case is shallow, accursed

To penury of yourself, self built on quicksand

Because my case is the case of man

Not so much about me—scratch that

I had to write this to you,

Because I realized, quite surprisingly

That all the energies you summoned

Against me could easily be tapped

Into some initiative—learning maybe?

Because if you think about it

I drink the potent brew of minds

All of them combined can’t be wrong

Even if you breathe hail and brimstone

I will clinically drizzle them bit by bit

I have put out infernos-what is fire

towering in a tea glass, friend?

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Blame it on Me (Audio Version)

Martin Luther King Jnr (Audio Version)

We march on with Martin Luther King Jnr

Traversing the streets of Nairobi, Uganda and Tanzania

Singing “we shall overcome”

Marching on through tear gas canisters

Passing through a jet of hot water

In true fashion of satygraha

For the “latter-day-God’s-children”

We march on singing “Haki Yetu”

Infused with the vision of a bright future

Carrying behind us the shadow of maimed souls

Holding in our hearts the bravery of our forefathers

Symbolically walking into our future

We march on with the voices

Dating back to centuries past

Others not heard, tucked away in a nation’s closet

Of bloody past

We march on with voices to be born

Of “brothers’ keepers”

Of “sisters’ keepers”

With fire “shut in their bones”

With  voices true to pin

In a fiduciary capacity

To hold society’s values in trust

We march on through the streets of Nairobi,

Dar-es-Salaam and Kampala

Waving olive leaves

Wearing white gowns

Stepping on pavements in saintly pace

Waving at shops in brotherhood

In unison shouting “Peace”

And at every stop, we demonstrate

Our concern for humanity

The rising food prices

The below-par development

The executions

The corruption

We demonstrate the lost future

Of children unborn

Yet indebted by present-day

Extravagance

We demonstrate the sorrow

Of cancer patients

Persons with HIV/AIDS

Being eaten away

In the periphery, yet

At the centre, they

Have the life-blood

We march on with with Martin Luther King Junior

In satyagraha

To demonstrate the urgency of the moment

To fight for “God’s children”

We march on, undaunted

We march with Luther King Jnr.

Ode to Nelson Mandela (Audio Version)

This Lady I Loved (Audio Version)

Letter To Son (Audio Version)

If I Could (Audio Version)

God Recites a Poem (Audio Version)

Come O Brother( Audio Version)

This is For You ( Audio Version)

Ten Minutes in Nine

Child of Shame

For my readers who had read "Child of Shame" here's an attempt I made at reciting that poem. Hey, I just uploaded it with all the errors in it purposefully-- to make you laugh. More importantly, I have to start somewhere. I fumbled through the Movie Maker program and hey presto here's how my voice sounds.

I am still experimenting. Let me know your random thoughts ( ha ha).

To Me, Reading is Me

It was a joke, or let us say
The most hard-hitting statement:
"If you want to hide anything from Africans
Hide it in a book"
First I looked at the statement from afar
Unsure about its veracity or intentions
Then I drew closer to it, we were now
Eye-ball to eye-ball
Its cold gaze and grimace said it all
I looked around
Half-baked graduates with half-baked ideas
With half-baked dreams
You see professors in ghostly rimmed glasses
Lecturing from notes written twenty years ago
Fraud intellectuals, quack doctors, quack lawyers
Quack experts
You find 'experts' learned in abstractions half-understood
Postulating on the science of man and plants
What books have they read if not those
Big tomes of technical whatnots?
What novel have they read?
Which page-turner have they flipped?
Have they read Shakespeare or Dunia Mti Mkavu?

Many ask what makes a man tick
I say what he reads from pleasure
And as they speak, we notice it
That occasional phrase from Lewis Carrol
That beautiful imagery, that proverb from our people
We are not robots, we are human first!

To betray our fear
We avoid carrying books openly
As if some curious soul might ask
'Hey, is that a book you carry?'
What is amiss?
If I carry an encyclopedia and a collegiate dictionary
On my arms, which section of the law have I breached?
Plus it is my arms, right?
Now, if I go to the library
Why should I brush it off with
'Got to do some assignment'
To whom do I owe an apology
To drink from the fountain of knowledge?

I have no apology to make

Now or in the future
Call me a 'bookworm' all you want
How I wish you knew of a new book's
Fragrance
If only you sat through the night reading
Grisham's book
Sometimes laughing, sometimes crying
Had you discovered 'you' in a book
Travelled to new lands, coursed through
A poet's quill, got agitated for a character murdered
Yearned for a moment to whisper escape to your hero
Hopped onto a train chugging through history
Witnessed man's tragedy, uncovered well-kept secrets
Discovered heroes and heroines
If only you experienced a drop of this
Out of the ocean of man's treasure trove
You would consider calling me a bookworm
May be not exactly, because
This life, brother, is a book
The North Pole and South Pole are the Covers
And the breathing souls inside are the characters
We learn from them, we unlearn from them
We relearn from them--in real time.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Free At Last! Viva South Sudan!

"We have resolved to overcome the past and face the future with a renewed sense of purpose, and it has stirred a forgiveness and reconciliation." 

           --South Sudan Legislative Assembly Speaker James Wani Igga

Photo credit: Roberto Schimdt

It was a joy that reverberated across
From Juba to Kakuma Refugee Camp
It was a tear that escaped an eye
Just one tear-drop that lay hidden
In the gun-powder and mutilated bodies
A tear that lay for years
Still, chilled by horror
Concealed in fear
Suppressed devoid of happiness

As we watched
The clock ticking
The banner saying, 'free at last'
Garang's mausoleum watching by
Battery of journalists thronging by
The many of the returnees coming back home
We could not express that pride
For when the heart sings
Sometimes we keep quiet to let it flow

And to express that moment
One South Sudanese said, 'People
say that we will have problems
but all I know is that we have freedom'
As I watched his countenance
He looked like one who
escaped death, lived in a refugee camp
and drenched in squalor of seeing home up in flames
I believed his words, totally


And from your brother from Kenya
March on, March on, South Sudan
You have inhaled the intoxicating fumes
Of misery, why should you then suffocate
from the mild tempered gas of a new dawn?
You have waded through the empty sands
alone in war, why then as a nation
should you die at the oasis?
With the Proclamation of Independence
What else do you need if not the hurried
Steps to catch up with us, your brothers?
March on, March on, South Sudan

C) Lorot Salem 2011


Lorot Son of the Hills' Notes:

This poem was meant to be written on Saturday 9th July 2011 on the occasion of the birth of the Republic of South Sudan, the 54th state of Africa. However, I was trapped in my scholarly works and tight schedules. But as always, better late than never. Here's to South Sudan...Viva South Sudan!

The Fools' Declaration

Let it be known to all men,

This 6^th day of July 2011,

The year of our Lord

That we the fools

Of the world

ASHAMED by the knowing lot

EMBARRASSED by their posturing of intelligence

DISCOMFITED by the rat-tat-tat of their speeches

CHAGRINED by meaningless science and arts

DISTURBED by the widening gap of us and the “wise”

DISMAYED by the open disregard to our low intellects

Hereby

Pass this instrument

We have suffered at the hands of the quick-witted

Throughout ages to this present moment

And now, through this instrument,

We exercise our right to self-determination

And to chart our destiny through our foolish means

We exercise our right to be fools

Of course without injury to the “wise”

This right we want to exercise

Without being mocked, ridiculed, exposed to contempt

By the “wise” at all times

To our children, present and yet to be born,

Let this instrument be our bequest to them

Not to fear to exercise their stupidity

To add figures using their toes,

To translate English to their local language,

To never again live in fear of being wrong

To our folks in the art of politics

Let this instrument protect you

From the quick tongue of the rat-a-tats

Who speak 300 words per minute

Let this instrument put away your shame

Of not being of their march

We, the fools of the world,

Show our commitment to shun anything of knowledge

The books, the volumes of frightening information,

The documentaries, the periodicals, the internet

We demonstrate our resolve to retain our identity

Even with the threats of globalization,

book-nization, internet-nization

We promise not to be moved

And to stand firm by what we resolve

Let this declaration be our text

To be followed into posterity

Let it enshrine our rights and duties

Our privileges and limitations

Let us be kept simple

Amidst the floods raging in the planet

Of men drowning in knowledge

Blown by the wind of information gibberish

Devastated by the earthquake of too much facts

Let us be kept safe from the madness of the wise

Signed____________________________________

All the fools of the world.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Child of Shame

Due to be performed on 5^th August 2011 for a Spoken Word Poetry Slam @ the Lily Pond Art Centre Nanyuki, Kenya ; The Theme is on Street Life Experience. More entries are invited and to be directed to Lily Pond Art Centre. Let us have fun.

Song Intro:

Na na na na…na na na na

Na na na na…na na na na

……………………

Ni chuki, ndio na hisi
Nikiwaza jinsi
Mlivyojitolea kuniudhi
Bila matokeo yaani

Ni chuki, ndio na hisi
Nikiwaza jinsi
Mlivyojitolea kuniudhi
Bila matokeo yaani

Na na na na…na na na na } x 2

…………………………

Credit: Song: “Chuki” (Hatred); Artist: Wyre

Rain patters, Cold shatters,

Misery bites, loneliness invites

Darkness creeps, solitude stings

Welcome to my world, share in my word

I sit here in the garbage mound

This I call home, this I call my place

And you…you sit in your expensive homes

Perimeter-walled as a fence

As for me…as for me, my fence is my skin

Unclothed, dirty, baked in human filth

I do not complain

As you drive by comfortably

On a Sunday afternoon, your leisure stops

Immediately, you securely roll up your windows

And look the other way, away from me, away from my misery

It is as if by avoiding looking at me, I will disappear

I wish I could but I am there in my indignity

I am that mud in your car tyres, I don’t belong

I am your chokoraa, degrade me! Go on, distance me!

I rummage through rotten food in the bins

Some time I get lucky, other times I don’t

Most times we fight to live, there are many of us here

We keep watch of the dustbin trucks, they are our saviours

And as they unload our daily food onto the bins, our day’s worries are offset

Then, then we worry about the askari

For our crime of sleeping in the streets, we are lashed

Chased down alleys, break our legs on manholes

Get torn backs, bruised heads

And we somehow live on to see another day

Others die, die from the injuries

But no one knows, no one cares

After all, our story is shameful

Not good for the country

I am your child of shame

I expose your limitations

As I sleep in the roundabout

With no roof over my head

I mock you, you in a 4-bedroomed house

And you, you my leader in a leafy suburb

As I light up polythene to keep warm

And suck on glue, you, you who is in a posh

Sitting room, I mock your cold heart

Your house may be warm but is your heart warm too?

As rain pours on me and July cold wraps me

I mock you, you who brought me to the streets

I blame you, yes, you, you who sired me

Abandoned me, you who ignored better laws

To protect me, you who despised me…

At times on a Sunday I hear a preacher preach

There is nothing as great as love

I doubt him:

If love was great, why could I be hated so

The piercing eyes, the cold grin, the mean looks

The hurried steps

It is as if I want to beg from them

And when they do, they throw a coin

And count that as charity

What charity!

All I want is to be loved, to be appreciated

To be counted, to belong…not your coins

After all, I eat from the dustbin

As I see my friends walking with their parents

A sense of sadness sweeps me, overpowers me

The clothes they wear, I should wear too

The shoes they put on, I should put on too

The love they receive, I should receive too

I see them happy, I see them jump about

I feel like I could play with them

But I cannot, I could not, probably never will

See, I don’t belong, I am chokoraa

I walk away, away in sadness

Sadness that I am a dirt, I am grime, I am filth…takataka

I am a child of shame

I walk away… to the rain, to the cold, to the misery

To the darkness, to the solitude

And wait for another day half-asleep at the roundabout

If, only if the askaris don’t come for me

Or it rains, or I am run by a vehicle,

Or I catch cholera at night or mauled by a dog

Or (you never know) caught by a stray bullet

Boom! Boom! Boom! Another pest rid of society

Another statistic, another figure…till we meet chokoraa

Till we meet child of shame…till we meet…till we meet…

End Song

…………………………………….

I'll see you when you get there

If you ever get there, see you when you get there

I'll see you when you get there if you ever get there

See you when you get there  x2

……………………………………………..

From Coolio’s Song, I see You When You get There

Lorot Son of the Hills' Note:

Chokoraa- A derogative name for a 'street urchin'. Urchin is also a politically incorrect term coined at the height of widespread hate for street children. I also oppose "watoto wa kurandaranda mitaani" translated loosely to " children who roam the streets" because this heightens the stigma already attached to them. A more humane term should be coined.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Moon versus Sun (Championship Title)

Like a true poet, I am no slave to shackled thoughts

My mind imagines things, it is all over

You think about ordinary issues

Very predictable:

It is sunny today—not that I disagree

But I would love to see the sun breathe its rays

On your bald pate and see you arguing with it

Along these lines, “Sun, cool off your tempers

How about saving your energy for the night

Moon came over to my neighbourhood

Boasting of his might”

Sun would reply:

“Really? I am king, ain’t I?”

“Yes you are, you rule the Milky Way,” he would say,

“But my problem with you is that you rule during the day”

“What kind of talk is that?”

“I am just saying”

Moon would be strolling by, thoroughly amused

Sun would gleam at him and say,

“Moon, looks like we haven’t had a fight for quite a while now”

“Yep. I am spoiling for a fight. Let the fight begin”

Moon would let out a war cry, chest-thump

And say something like, “Not my fault I have to kill”

Sun would equally say, “Let the galaxy witness this,

Moon has asked for it”

The argument would go on for a while

The observer would let say Africa be the boxing ring

And kick everyone from the ring and blow the whistle

Moon would do some push-ups and somersault

Sun would be cool, calculating

They would size each other up

Besides the ring would be a gigantic fire extinguisher

The size of Antarctica

A brush of punches lets a spark

Now, the ring is smoke-filled,

Moon is retreating….Sun is advancing

Blows are raining on somebody….a grunt is heard

More smoke now…fire…fire…Moon dashes out of the ring

And jumps into the Atlantic Ocean…Sun follows him up…

The ref restrains him…Sun says, “Gotta teach him a lesson,

I am sun. I am the King. How dare he!”

Now Moon is holding up a white flag and coming up

Plucks an olive branch…waves it…

The galaxy’s breath lets out…that was very, very close

Africa would have burnt out!

C) Lorot Salem 2011