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

Ode to Nelson Mandela

African Son, Child of Earth
The Great One, The Horn of Peace
Embarrassed I am to pen a poem of your profile
I am a nonentity.

I have read your biography
I have read your speeches
I have watched mankind welcome you
Just to be close to who you really are.

But I have no inkling of being in jail
For people's liberation.

Now in sunset of your years
With power struggles
Famine
Poverty
Corruption
Our continent is still poisoned
Mzee Madiba, what apt lesson should we extract?

What lesson of selflessness
Told to the world at Robben Islands
Should we seek?

Mzee Mandela, African Son, Child of Earth
The Great One, The Horn of Peace
What tribute do we pay to our fallen gallant fighters
For self-determination?
What shall we say of Sharpeville and Sisulu?
Did our forefathers have to die in vain?
Where is Matunda ya Uhuru?

I have an idea, Mzee Madiba
Let every elder from every hamlet meet you
Let them pour libation and ward off evil
Let them unearth arrows and bayonets
Let them speak blessings.

Call this meeting soon, I beg of you
Let our sons and daughters who lead us converge
Let them tell the elders why they are poisoning our land
Let them tell us why they keep kola nuts to themselves
Let them tell us who bewitched them with failed leadership.

Call this meeting soon, I beg of you
The Great One, the Horn of Peace
Then call poets who can chew words
Let them sing for peace
Let them sing dirges of buried dreams
Let them chastise our sons and daughters who shame us
Let them craft rhyme and meter to laugh at us
Let them satirize our pretence and hypocrisy.

Call this meeting soon, I beg of you
The Great One, the Horn of Peace.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Write Me a Letter

Write me a letter, Sweet One,
A letter whose first paragraph will cloud my eyes
A letter with Englishicated English
A letter with words like perambulate
A letter with a dedication of top ten songs
A letter perfumed and dusted with powder

Write me a letter, My Beloved,
In your slanting handwriting
A letter that I will read in class
And all my friends will turn green with envy
A letter that I will keep under the pillow
A letter which if your parents saw you will be excommunicated

Write me a letter, the Pupil of my Eye,
A letter that has never been written by any other lady
A letter that I will read in class, in the loo and deep into the night
A letter with the last paragraph that will defy comprehension
A letter that will make up for our long distance

Write me a letter, the Breath of my Voice,
A letter that will remind me of the sugarcane we chewed
A letter whose words will jump from paper to heart
A letter that will bewitch me
A letter that will be shy yet bold
A letter that will be uncensored yet suspense-filled
A letter of friendship yet intimate

Write me a letter, the Goddess of the Hills,
A letter that has never been written by a lady
A letter that will pulsate in my heart
A letter that can sing
A letter that will remind us of butterflies and bees.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Daughter of a Woman

My bull with crossed horns, Longolemwai,

Witness this, Witness this, Longolemwai

When we were trapped in the crossfires of the bullets

Trapped in panyirit thorns in no-man’s-land

Trapped in steep gulleys with no food to eat but among’oo and angalalio 

We did it the two of us, just the two of us

Witness this, Witness this, Longolemwai

The daughter of a woman has trapped my heart, Longolemwai

The daughter of a woman is making my heart go in circles

The daughter of a woman, my bull, is like sour milk

Served in dry season

The daughter of a woman is millet porridge with milk and pyöpay 

The daughter of a woman has the eyes of gazelles

The daughter of a woman goes to the river and oh, the way she moves her hips

The daughter of a woman makes my blood boil

I can jump and hit my head on heaven

I can jump and make a hole on earth with my feet

The daughter of a woman has trapped my heart, Longolemwai

Witness this, Witness this, Longolemwai

My bull with crossed horns, Longolemwai,

The daughter of a woman has trapped my heart, Longolemwai

C) Lorot Salem 2011

God’s Own Timing

Mortal Man,

Suffer, Mortal Man, Suffer

Find comfort in the solitude of your worries

Look back to the day gracefully

Never whine, never curse

Armour yourself with faith of a new day

Don’t worry of tweedle little things

Dream instead of all possibilities

Wrought by big vision and big faith

Mortal Man,

Forsaken you are not

Clay is made brick in furnace

Gold is not gold without heat

Darkest it is before dawn

I have seen men rise from grass to class

Why should you despair?

Mortal Man, stand firm

Your foothold be the Mountain Peaks

Your grasp be the Stars

Your hope be Transcendent

Your Faith be to Tororot.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Plundered Dreams

This is no chitchat

Of bush romance.

This is no idle talk

Of women in well.

This is no gossip

Inside a barber shop.

Words that can make or break nations

These words are,

Emotions that can draw blood

From the skulls of killed soldiers

These emotions are,

Grief that can explode

Hearts of the oppressed

These grieves are.

This is no Bush-Romance-Chit-Chat

An Elegy it is of borrowed dreams

Coarse conscience

Mutilated mien

Choreographed calmness

Stale stance

This is not an idle talk

A commentary it is of broken pieces

riddled roses

Flaring flames

Sickening sirens

These words

Are the buried bodies of plundered dreams

Mocking their epitaphs.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Of Legal Realm I Speak

Of Legal Realm I speak

Of Laws of Men and God

Of Crimes and Punishment

Of Jurisprudence and Maxims

Of Legal Realm I Speak.

I Speak in legal jargons

As if I am possessed by the Spirit of Lord Denning

I think in three dimensions

Talk like an orator before hang

Spilling law most hidden

Of Legal Realm I speak

Of Laws of Men and God.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

The Law Is An Ass

So you heard the acclaim, friend

Of the double attributes of the self-same ass

Inside the Halls of Justice

Robed judges and murderers wield war

Coded in tacit technicalities

Worded in discreet Latin and English

The ass carries the baggage of man:

crimes, punishment,

remedy, redress

It pulls cart of victim’s plea

But when the ass rebels it kicks

It is no respecter of persons

Paupers and kings

Lawyers and citizens

All drawn within

The radius of the incensed ass

So you are right, friend,

That the law is an ass

But if I may hazard

Why is your breath foul and incestuous mouthing ass

Intoned with twice as much a derogation as of an expletive?

C) Lorot Salem 2011

The Street Lawyer

I fancy myself a lawyer in the streets

Hereinafter referred to as Street Lawyer

Dressed not in crisp dark suits but ordinary street wear

Carrying not wheeled suitcases but newspapers and legal journals

Seated not in posh law firms but Aga Khan Walk and Job Corner

I am a Street Lawyer.

You will not find me in Conference Halls

Or Seminars

Chatting about Thomas Hobbes

I am a Street Lawyer.

You will find me in Studios

Canvassing on Hague and Rome Statute

Giving a legal angle to every current news on Telly

People think I am a mad man

Walking with torn pieces of Law Reports

People mistake me for a lunatic

Reciting maxims and Latin and sections

That makes me no less

A  Street Lawyer.

I am the law in motion

Not static in phlegmatic law handlers

I make law rotate and spin around mouths of men

People love me because I am their bridge, their Moses

I read sections of the constitution

And explain them as if it is a Class- Two- Baa- Baa- Black- Sheep- Rhyme

But I am friend to Tear Gas Canisters

For I also speak the Human Rights Language fluently

Thrice I have been poisoned, twice shot, dozen-times jailed

On trumped-up charges

For I am a Street Lawyer.

I speak straight and narrow

Even against the highest in the echelons of power

If I see travesty of justice, I cry murder

If I see sloth of the Legislature, I harangue

If I see the police killing aimlessly, I climb Street Lamps in protest

If I see Press gagged, I walk with them with mouth sealed

If I see my country steeped in impunity, I go on hunger strike

For I am a Street Lawyer

I speak the language of the common man.

C) Lorot Salem 2011

Your Honour, I plead guilty!

Your Honour, I plead guilty, if you so wish

For you glare at me in your horn-rimmed glasses

Dressed in red to welcome scums to halls of justice

Nose twisted heavenwards as if to ward off the stench of my crime.

I plead guilty, Your Honour

For you are impatient with me

You insist in ‘Guilty’ or ‘Not Guilty’

Blind to my ‘let me explain’

Eager to send me to oblivion.

I wanted to explain to you this thing slowly

The way men do

But you insist in barking at me

How will you know how it all started?

Is this the way people handle issues?

Your Honour, I am the wronged man here

I should be the object of your mercy

I can’t afford the price of a lawyer’s tongue

Every time I want to talk my way, you block my path

How can truth be found, Your Honour?

That is why I will say I am guilty.

But if we were in the village

I would call everyone and pass through the thighs of old men

And if I lie I die

Simple.

If I were in the village

I would drink from a calabash to declare my innocence

I would stand facing sunrise and say,

“Kinsmen, if I stole from Lokwarasia

then as the sun rises this morning, let me die with it in the evening”

And if I lie I die

Simple.

But here I will plead guilty.

C) Lorot Salem 2010

Goat Case

We gathered today under a tree

To settle a case of a stolen goat

And what a hard case that was!

The Accused stood in rebellion saying:

Kinsmen, which goat did I steal? Whose goat have I stolen?

Under a tree, today, we listened to this Goat Case all day long

Examination-in-chief, cross-examination

Evidence adduced, presumptions rebutted

Flared up emotions, plea for justice

And so all day long we listened to this Goat Case

Under a tree

Till we reached this verdict:

Both parties will avail themselves the next Market Sunday

Accused will carry a kid, victim will come with the mother-goat

If the kid runs to the mother-goat, the case is settled!

Market Sunday. Kid runs to mother-goat.

Case settled! Accused to pay fourteen goats and kumiket for judges.

Next file please!

C) Lorot Salem 2010

Law

If I were to postulate what law is

As Professors are wont

I would posit:

Law is what we think it is

An obfuscation of legal scholars

An enigma.

Why, defined law is everything we think it is

Which precise words can’t wholly describe

It is the minstrel to men

It is the arch-enemy of anarchy

It is what is in the bosoms of men

Not codes and statutes

It is imprinted in the conscience.

Law is not an UFO

Law is not an extra- terrestrial

Law is a citizen recognized by man.

C) Salem Lorot 2010