Home » Poems » Best » Te Indi » Best Te Indi Poems

Best Poems Written by Te Indi

Below are the all-time best Te Indi poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

Details | Te Indi Poem

Silly Slumber

A swirling gold wind
Speckles of dust
I thrust my neck in to feel this
I am bewildered, a smothered vine
floating into the ending
but I want to fight
Want to get up and break knuckles and limbs
to spread seeds
and say I mattered

This is the time we’ll remember and I can’t forget
that man on the corner
How we’re all allowed dreams
and those who shatter
are lessons for those who haven’t slept yet
I’m closing eyes to remember the fabric
of the depth of Godliness
The heat in my chest, the badness

And I’m weighing the contents of time to find
where I should be standing
Tightroping on the thin line before it’s enough
and my promises are voided as bluff
I’m mourning
Wailing against the sepulcher of my birth
The tomb of my purpose
And the dead leaves that surround the contents of my body
are ‘raptured’

There is no more time
We’re weeping in the instant we begin again
But they have left us
with our own salvation in our hands
and nowhere to go
No peace to find sleep
Good mourning

Details | Te Indi Poem

Soft Shell Casing

Carcass evens out sand
Skin lands in your hands
Push pass tainted smiles for better lands
Call me
When we reach the peak of boiling
and I've sweat out all my provisions
I'll answer
No need to memorize nonsense 
in your numbers stead
I will always know your name
And it plays like the knocking of two outside a manger
There is nothing holy here 
but lessons taught in down times
And so I practice dance for ballrooms I will never tread
You have never and will never see me
Call me
and I'll tell you how it's supposed to go
and you can teach her, them
It's too pretty outside to lose my mind
but you have it
Blow heat on kerosene and burn down your own monument
I'm tired

Details | Te Indi Poem

Molecules

Poetry for the blind
Songs for the deaf
An audience of living and breathing pulsating through the soul
they are waiting for the melody to push through the cracks
of gasps and moans
waiting for clenched fist that have never learned to fight
to ignite
and somehow
I won't be right below the brim, right under the surface, the light that never makes it through the blinds
I cannot be attempts
prayers
pleas
and then acceptance
of young dreams that never come to be
I have to be
something

Details | Te Indi Poem

Maladaptive Daydreaming Disorder

And maybe tonight in feasting
I'll inhale the flavors of my meal
and exhale colors in the wind
I have not been chosen
beyond our understanding, it just is
It’s the quiet that scares me
so I'm a puppeteer of the shadows
Dancing near the light source
to feed my lonely
I breathe this naturally
Another dimension
Another time
More laughter

I'm pacing and spinning
Yelling and singing
I'm in control
until the arch of my feet gets weak
from chasing the muse my bed becomes
And I'm tired
In prayer I lay
The only air left  to breathe is the regret of wasting the day 
It was never us
Just me filling the spaces of those I want to love
They are not here now
They cant share this with me
I'm only weak
It's only me

Details | Te Indi Poem

An Editorial Review On Pronunciation

I felt my name slip off his tongue 
Before he even thought to consider 
Whether to pronounce it 
Ashanti Asante or Asanti 

Oh Queen Nanny, let them be 
Pitch black warriors 
made night their playground 
and pounced on trespassers 
How long boat rides led to new languages of blackness 
Afrocentric heroes making mockery out 
of zeroes with puffed up chests 
I guess I must tell him its spelt Asante 
Choice pronunciation of Ashanti, my father had his way 

There are warriors with spears etched out in my name 
So remember this phoneme correctly 
Not for the sake of me 
I do no regret this happening 
If it means I must teach myself again 
About tall trees in mountains 
And hidden languages in Acompong 
Maroons 

I remember how my father referred to his skin 
in escape of midnight, unseen and out of sight 
Burn down these buildings and leave traces of nothingness 
That’s what we do 
People of the blue mountains and mango season 
Die bare back as we came in 
Never looking back at those small things 
 

A S A N T E 
Protect and preserve this thing here 
Great Golden stool, I have you
Asantewaa can’t fight for me 
She’s been conquered 

But I am here in the essence of new beginnings 
And they can’t steal this empire
Osei Tutu now crowns me with these words 
This is my kingdom set in proverbs 
Great in spirit 
I guess that’s why I've always been hot tempered 
You can't rename me now 
No Saul to Paul or Jacob to Israel 
It's meant this way 
I have to live up to those brutal conquest 
and lead brigades to free the souls 
of a beaten down distinction 
Asante or Ashanti 
If you know your history 

I used to trip up on the slip up 
Of mispronunciation 
They saw something in the water 
Intricately braided hair 
and rage beating down freedom out of clouds 
Spirit of fighters never forsook my tongue 
Now I fight with things like cold stares and pens 
Markers, paper, cell phone, notepads 
Times new roman font in unsaved documents recovered

I feel a bit of shame as I remember middle school 
Seventh grade 
I decided to give up and let them name me 
I didn’t want to explain the accent on the e 
How I put it there for flare 
Kromanti languages losing power on my position 
couldn’t find me overseas

Now I pipe up to them 'speak correctly'
to buy back years of Africa's lost history
It’s me now behind fogs 
Standing invisible amidst nothingness 
I go back and am back to the position 
and election of my name 
A S A N T E 
Asante or Ashanti 
Don’t forget the accent on the e

Details | Te Indi Poem

Suddenly, I Find Myself Smaller

There is brown here
A dooming neutrality
darkening to black
as I picture you
further than the
sleeve equipped for
my emotive exchanges

In my misspelled well wishings
I hope you thought kindly

I am not as bitter
as my mocking your pockets may seem
I prefer you this way

Except, you must understand
that the best way to please me
is to not

And out of the other twenties that
never returned my message
I'd like to think you
had no words fit
so you got distracted by new days

We move from sepia to chocolate
as I express my disdain for anything
flavored this way
The lighthearted rejection of my preference
tells that I like the mild meekness of vanilla
The subtlety of a stronger after taste
Than the floating prior

There will never be two of us in this room
Just me and the choice existence of others
when my echoes become too loud for my bed
And I'll dance for the shadows left by empty chairs
and your space in the slow developing abyss in my head
-----The part where the heart carries it's waste
And when it's clean we can transition

I move from chocolate to bistre
Skipping the smoother movements
of a learning tree

There's no way to end
what's more than the grasp of my hands
And so I can only make a guess
That in a revolution
we'll be pitch black 

Asante Indira 11/30/2012

Details | Te Indi Poem

It Always Ends Badly When It Never Ends

I'm placing strings in needles and creating new seams
Pricking fighting fingers for what this brings
Opening the lines of smiles with softer things
but you like to rip
like to tear bandages 
with  no interest in blood
just the sound of a breaking, the wince
The mystery of what's under the covers
calls you here
but you play hide and no speak with bloodletting
Planning puppet shows in your dwelling

There is no more time to look for needles and strings
Let's lay it here bare
See how the clot of your presence
causes more hemorrhage
Thinking nothing of tachycardic pitter pats
I just figured that
this is how it flows
and maybe the sadist will enjoy newly marred skin
Soft pink hues clashing with new fabric, this is more than a bruise

I dreamt of babies in past times
So maybe you'd bless me
bring new dressing for wounds too old to place but too deep to forget
and you did, long enough for the browning of raised skin
creating camouflage of a better understanding
but what does camouflage do?
Stepping out of coverings revealing the ravaging you

You are sharp edges hitting kneecaps
splinters in my feet
You are strange slithering things beckoning to eat
wrapping choking, heavy body around all things meek
You are the reason for silver linings
Creating shadows for the bleak

Details | Te Indi Poem

Black

This is it, the visceral
A mud laden intention for the perfect
And the prefect knows we don’t deserve it
but in morning yawning I’m yearning
To sheen without the glisten
To be of worth without the wealth
To matter in spite of mass

Come sing in the keys of dandelions
and roar like the hidden root
I prefer to blacken my estate
than to yellow at the petals,
fixing myself for your taste
 
Somewhere in the dirt 
Some hand clenching at the shine
of the only future it deserves
is cut off
Someone picking up my charms 
Somewhere, far away
So far that in knowing these truths, it doesn’t matter
It has no mass
These are not atoms
This is only shape

Details | Te Indi Poem

His Dinner Table

Blackened meats on stove stops and grills
A better taste
A distaste between wills
I find her on my hunting ground with
the possessions belonging to my plate
But I have no plate

I put down bows arrows knives and pride
to give back men like you
who take advantage of the miles
to make two meals
and no supper
One should suffer
because I have never eaten
and etched into menus with your name
But by the sweat of your brow
I'll never eat
Put in practice limp muscles for my own feast
And I can't blame you
For that's the nature of the beast
Sneaking bites between lunch and dinner
But it helps me to keep
my center in forever motion
so I too can have meat

Details | Te Indi Poem

I Miss You

I'm churning milk out of butter
but with you I curdle
Cuddled and rolled into corners
because there is a space here that hits
me in the center of my chest
I'm losing breath
counting down to when it'll be me in your presence
This place here for you
I find a darkness and a tomb of your efforts
but I am back expecting to start where we finished
so I can get rest

I want to inhale your purchased new scent
and listen to stories
I want to be filled off of your company
so I skip meals until you're gone
and I find myself hungry
 I want to pretend, want to pretend
that I'm not listening, that these moments
are meant only to take up time
Want to watch you adjust your load so you can carry mine

And what can I say when you ask of my tries?
That I've answered?
How can you measure my affection
when it's what I'm too scared to lose?
Come fill this spot here
before my body collapses without the support
I need your figure, height looming over me

And now in some room your concentrated on
things that don't concern me
when everything I am concerns you
I don't know how I hide it so well
don't know where I tuck it
but I know the silence in this room 
is beating into my drums and I want you 
to stop it