Best Any(A) Poems
W eeping fills the hangar as his casket is brought out,
E mbraced by Old Glory's colors, a fitting soldier's shroud.
L oved one's hearts are shattered, future hopes, dreams are crushed;
C omrades in arms salute him, adding a bittersweet touch.
O verwhelming grief consumes those left behind,
M eaningless words, platitudes spoken to be kind.
E arnest tales of bravery told of him who died.
H eavy with emotion, a nation shares regrets,
O ffering condolences to those who won't forget.
M any a brave soldier has been welcomed home this way.
E nding future ventures, they've come home to stay.
Entered in Susan Burch's Little Viewed Jewels contest.
The sensation of butterflies flying within
As your heart joyously sings
An Angelic being growing inside
As your growing tummy gets harder to hide
The bond with your baby already so strong
You pray that nothing will go wrong
The instinct of the Mother already working
For any dangers that may be lurking
Your tummy ripples, your baby has awoken
The love you feel needs not be spoken
Upon your tummy you place your hand
On the growing bump that continues to expand
What a wonderful, magical time to be alive
Harbouring a soul that intends to eventually arrive
Keeping baby safe, warm and protected
While the umbilical keeps you literally connected
Being in control of the life of another
Is a great privilege to any a Mother
Never take this role for granted, EVER
As the way you shape your child, goes on forever.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
©copyright Juanita Torr
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
If a “friend” cancels you like a stamp, they never were you
friend in the first place!
Friends give people space to be themslves! They welcomed you,
and trusted you in their heart’s space,
Moreover, not one of us wants a friend, that thinks they are a god.
A Mr.or Mrs, stuffed shirt, an inelligensia of know it all?
A friend need not be a Ph,D to us, nor flash her or hishatred in our face.
That is an inhumane, arrogant disgrace!
Just someone who truly cares about us, who and honors us as we are!
With understanding, grace andd gentleness, of and compassion beyond par!
And always remembers.. we all part of the human race,
By God’s most kind and generous holy grace.
Hatred and genocide in any, a hideous and ugly face!
1/26/2025
Granpa, when you was a kid
Did you thinks a running away from home
And look un see what's over that hill
Roundup wild horses
An bucks um out jist for a thrill?
How did you comes to get clear out here
I hear Pennsylvanie ain't to near
Was you a kid or was you old
When you packed up your bag un left home?
Was you in the war like Uncle Zeke and Granpa Don
Has you been up to the mountains like Davey done
How bouts the Injins did you knows any a them
An how bouts the buffalo how many did you kill?
Tell me granpa was granma way out here
Or did you has to goes someplace else to gets her
What about my daddy was he anything like me
Or did he jist wants to see what he could see?
I know's I's jist a girl, granpa
But I don't wants to does womans things
I wants to be a cowboy and does what they does
Help me, help me granpa, I come to you because
You're the smartest, wisest, kindest man I know
I love you, granpa
R ita was deflowered
A gainst her will. Ravished. Her
P light, a torture, that
E nsued a trauma
I t is a degrading abomination to
S exual assault a women
A manifestation of madness. For
N o rational man shall intend this atrocity
I t is despicable and selfish to rape
N o to rape! It's our plea
D iscontinue sexual assault
I t is a foe of a happy womanhood
G uardians, and parents, do
N ot assault your wards and off springs
I t is an indignity to woman hood
T reat women with worthiness
Y earningly, we reiterate
T ime records myriad cases
O f sexual assault
W hen shall it go extinct?
O r die for eternity?
M any a women
A re with a trauma
N ote,
H ousing headaches and fear
O h, Alas!
O h! The pain, how
D espicable rape is!
Closer to the clouds
Soaring through the soft misty flocks of vapour
Higher
Touching the overstretched never ending horizons
Stronger
Closer to the clouds
Reaching for the elusive galaxy scattered with stars
Wiser.
Metempirical
Scenes
Outside my window, birds perched on window panes
Breathing the hopes of life
Burying their worries, letting them go
Soaring away the pains of yesterday
Home
The distance reassures me of the longer road I have
Waiting working of what might come
Relieving the old alleys
Streets that left me hanging, roaming
Stranded with loneliness
Pause
Break from the fast pace of life
Dive into total surrender
Break from our shallow life filled with plans
The never ending ambitious dreams
Capturing each moment, not giving any a miss
Forgotten
The small sentiments
The simple notions
The innocent thoughts
And the crazy bedlams
Unfortunate
Life
Thrive, we will.
Tying a Tie
Standing at the mirror
A tie around my neck
Trying so hard to tie it
But it always looks like a wreck
Retired and somewhat older now
It’s been years since I wore a tie
But the cruise says its dress up day Tuesday
And my wife says I have to comply
The wide side goes over then under
Then does it go over again?
Then sooner or later I think
It comes up from under my chin
And then it goes down through the loop
A loop that I should have still had
Then I pull on the short end
And the knot shouldn’t look all that bad
I tried it and tried it and tried it
As any a sane man would
But no matter how many times I tried
The knot never would look too good
So I called a friend
And I brought him a tie
He tied it for me
And now I can get by
Who ever thought
That this day would come
When a man of some smarts
Would be feeling this dumb
American soldiers have fought many wars
on foreign and very distant shores, hoping to raise
their Star-Spangled Banner on barren soil when victory
is finally declared to all who love peace and yearn for freedom.
The young ones always put up the fight of the lion,
moving forward, gaining ground and seizing territory
while screams of death from blood-gushing bodies fill the somber
and chilly day; how can they console that dying warrior companion
who squeezes their hand and knows that death is coming to dim his sight?
I doubt if any a soldier thinks of a Medal of Honor on the battlefield,
his instinct is to protect himself and his combat buddies
in case of a possible attack: glory is a far-fetched
thought on his attentive and aggressive mind.
Today there aren't enough words to say, " Thank you, brave soldiers! "
Consider yourself lucky to have survived and come home to hug
your family and friends! Are your tears, true tears of joy...
remembering how your battle buddies faced horrible death;
and while they hung on life, their souls fled to the adored homeland.
Literary Device: Mood
while thinking of their far and loved homeland?
Written on 11/11/ 2015
C hristians around the world
H ail His holy name
R evel in His glory
I n our souls, He dwells forever
S eek the Lord our God
T ears He shed for our sins
M any a sinner shall be saved
A ll doubters will soon believe
S avior to one and all...
I ask you, “Where might we go:
A land to, or a land fro;
Let the land like a river flow.
Leave yourself behind, and dare,
Dare to know Thoreau.”
Ahh, how the day is
The simplest of all revolutions.
The sun, bright - cannot be missed--
Once departed without ever departing; now
Obvious after lunar-evolution.
The plotting and seeking,
Groping and the hoping:
Blindly in the night
Seeing that which is apart from sight.
But now.
Now, we must depart
To meet our journey…
*Sigh*
See how the sun has risen to set.
Come so far without movement
Tell me: does it regress?
Or is it perhaps, progress.
Disregard my laughter;
For who is the fool?
The fool, or he who follows..
The room takes shape
Darkness illuminates
Like light cracking drapes,
Bare or not, it stimulates..
A stairwell brings inquisition,
Beckoning steps toward the next
And the next and the rest!
Ah yes, the rest,
As many interpretations as a note.
II
See the equations before you,
Like onions-- keep your eyes peeled.
Wryly dancing around thy head.
Stall you tears; fears be shed
Forget the illusion
And any a delusion.
Logic and feeling rotate to portray
This sage's mental ballet.
Voodoo of the mental juju,
With "x2 +y2 = 1" as the tutu.
Confidence in that knowledge
Shall blend solemn passage
For the minute hand is spinning,
The hour hand a'twirling
Let us make haste for:
There was never any
Now will there ever exist
Any time to lay to waste!
Approach the stairs,
Harken that specter-stare!
Alas, in the dark; notice be absolved.
Yonder face far from sight's resolve
Dare to describe it!
A head with shade as pigment
Dark & rich like the night
Translucent in sight.
Eyes leer like pearl
(Allow peace to unfurl)
A face serving witness:
Purely as a pittance
Dread not the shade;
Light astounds from dark's fade
Virgil kept Dante from Oblivion
With true, epic passion
Do not think that face: death
Quotidian rhythm is life's breath.
Leave that Specter
Come, follow your mentor.
See how he fades;
And you nearly bowed, scathed.
Now ascend the stairs,
To who knows where...
Go, before the clock begins
And forsake no secular reins
Buy the ticket. Take the ride.
Quite simply, It seems
Sunken jewels always gleam
Depart into the unknown
No need for any asylum
A farmer praised a bird for its capability
Of eating up all the insects upon the crops:
Fantastic! It certainly contributes to high yields
Of crops enough for everyone a finer year
The bird listened but didn't conceive appropriate
Yielding a few words plain and insipid:
Eating up insects is not something we favor
"Eat as you desire" is just us a habit
Provided you guys wipe out worms by insecticides
We would not have any a piece of advice
As a fact as everyone knows, birds drink and eat
When no insects could capture
We, our birds, eat your crops for sure
‘Ossi’, what Western side likes them to call,
East returning complements with ‘pushy’,
No more stands there the brick-and-mortar wall,
Love’s lost still in old animosity.
The wall o’er a decade and half back fell,
Yet, an iron curtain still them divide,
Minds cannot meet over the wall of pride,
Hurt heart and prejudice can’t that gulf scale.
‘I’d rather a spouse from a foreign shore
‘Bring than one from behind iron curtain,’
Felt one from across the long secured door,
Deep and wide does divide decades of pain.
Here lingers a dislike, there disdain old,
What venom brethren nurse for each other!
An open war has turned into one cold,
Togetherness in search of fair tether!
‘Too hot’ for us these women from the West,
‘Hard to please, pushy, far too material,
‘Everything about them seems commercial,
‘From old world do we come and too modest’.
‘Too darn dense be these people from the East,
‘Lacking any a style whatsoever,
‘Forever on a bargain-hunting heist,
‘Let them savour their old odious flavour’.
Wall was felled to enable two-way flow,
Heads still finds it hard to communicate,
Bridges and trains, mutual dialogue to grow,
Yet, hard it is distanced hearts to placate.
Love and passion when at a premium come
In too short a period of years fifteen,
Old prejudices play a harder drum,
Not easy 'tis long-closed closets to clean.
World has its Kashmir, long-gulfed Koreas too,
And torn-apart people elsewhere a few,
A healer great, mighty teacher is time,
If not today, morrows may sing in rhyme.
______________________________________________________
The Berlin Wall came down some 15 years back on 9th November1989. But the iron curtain continues to divide the two people that history separated. Only two per cent of marriages every year are between the East and the West Berliners, which under normal conditions should have brought together one-third to half of the couples in a city its size. Yet, they are 12 times more likely to marry foreigners. After the wall fell, there came the euphoria only to die soon. A lingering dislike persists between the two sides. Yet, in all fairness 15 years is too short a period to mitigate the wounds inflicted by 60 years of separation. Time, let us hope, will prove a great healer that it is.
______________________________________________________
Happenings | 01.11.04 |
I recall, to our life when she came—
In early nineties one unknown day,
Few did know for long years: who she was—
Her mission, and what she wished to do,
And someone called it an Info Age:
Internet, e-mails and e-media—
Some of them more social than are ants,
In tone and temper unfairly free—
And info-knowledge spread sans limit,
But in just two decades we feel drowned.
Overload of info, opinions:
Social sites tweeting, tubes, sundry sites,
Searching sites, kindling books, what not apps,
Bits and bytes gagging us over board!
An ocean of Info, every shade,
Informing less and confusing more,
Now telling, and contradicting then;
But time was we had next to nothing.
Bits, bytes, nor statistics info is,
Nor info knowledge is— never was.
News nigh fake, more of views than are news,
Far from truth, confuse more than give clues,
Verified by none but someone's whim,
Twenty four by seven, news and news!
Ignorance a maiden of pure bliss,
No one has questioned camouflaged views,
Neut media morphing unto sour dream,
Even views are now of varied hues—
Fruits of a fertile mind, partial pen,
Better was bliss of ignorant Zen!
Ere, soul of Info to inform was.
And inform it sure did without doubt,
Today it seems to drown us in doubt,
I doubt if the curious little bird,
Even if ravenous hungry is,
I f any a worm would ever catch!
Time was when info an asset was,
And people hungered for a bare byte.
From heaps of husk and shells, piles of chaff,
It is hard today to garner grain.
Maiden sure she’s no doubt, no more shy,
Like peels of onions she hides nigh!
______________________________________________________
Happenings | 16.03.2017 |
Poet’s note: This piece is not a typical ode. It is nine syllabic three feet anapaest, and largely a blank verse.
No man's too small to hoist a helping hand,
Nor any a deed too small if well-meant,
Nor a task too tough for a noble end,
Mind can if means can't make a mighty dent.
A journey of a daunting task off shore
Begins with but a single step forward,
‘Drop by drop filleth lakes’ is no vain lore,
An ounce of action… oft have we this heard.
Many a learned man knows this truth well,
But rather than help he spins hyper hypes.
Intention matters more, how a squirrel
Strove to earn mythical laurels and stripes,
So goes a tiny squirrel's tallest lore,
Silent did she work building a barrage—
An episode from an epic of yore,
So sang sage Valmiki of ancient age.
A folktale, an aside from Ramayana:
Rama's spouse abducted was to an isle—
Confined to a far off spot by Ravana,
That came camouflaged in a monk's fair guile.
When lured and mislead by a golden deer,
That too was the demon's bewitching guile,
In stealth when cried out, ‘O Lakshman, my dear',
And destiny unfolded in a while.
In Rama's voice the wily demon cried,
And Sita beseeched Lakshman, forcing him
To render help; what followed, a bad dream,
For, Ravan waited hiding in monk's hide.
The search began thence in woods and deep vales,
Hilly terrains, meadows and leas and dales,
And they came searching to where ends the land,
An ocean spread forth, looking like no friend.
Hanuman, Rama's key aid, a legend,
To whom no task too big was, such was he,
Then volunteered to leap across the land
To luring Lanka, a land across sea.
And returned soon with hopeful but sad tale:
Captive Sita’s safe in Ravan's red hands,
Who, in no mood peace parleys to avail,
Oh had to be dealt with on Lankan sands.
________________________________________
Originally Ramayana was written in Sanskrit by Valmiki, a sage who was a fierce bandit in his early life.
Epic | 06.04.13 |
Continued in Part II
Chuka Nnabuife: Nwoke Na Mma
(Ab? p?r? iche maka mmemme ncheta ?gb?gba ah? iri ise nke Sa Chuka Nnab?ife)
Izunna Okafor dere ab? a
A s? na mma nwoke b? mpempe akw?kw?
Mana nke ah? b? maka nd? ?j? akw?kw?
Maka na onye g?t? akw?kw?, ma o kwegh? ya
Mgbe ah?, ? s? ka ? ga bute ego
Maka na ? kpazie ya aka n'?n?, ? s? na ego b? mma nwoke
?f?d? s?kwa na ogologo imi b? mma nwoke
Mana nke ah? b? maka nd? j?tara ?n? ha
Onye lechaa onwe ya n'enyo, h? na ? d? ka isi mkpi
Mgbe ah?, o cheta na ogologo imi b? mma nwoke
Maka na ya onwe ya b? ?s? ohu imi
Nd? ?ka s?kwa na mma nwoke b? n'af? ?n?
N'ihi na ha onwe d?ka ihu mm??
Ego kwàrà ha, ogologo imi erugh?kwa ha aka.
Ha wee ghàdozie aka n'af? ?n?
We kwubezie na af? ?n? b? mma nwoke
N'ime ihe nd? a niile
Nke b? eziokwu b? na ?ha obodo maara mm?? ka ukwu
Maka na e jigh? nkume elele isi kara aka
Ngàla nwa ebuli b? n'ihe chi ya jiri g?z?e
Mana ka m mme ka ? mara
O nwere otu nwoke nwere ihe nd? a niile
? b? maaz? Chuka Nnab?ufe
? b?gh? naan? na ? g?r? akw?kw?
Kama ogologo imi ya ha ka nke ele
Af? ?n? ya hakwa ka nke ag?
Mpe mpe akw? na-esi juputakwara n'akpa ya
Maka na a s? onye ji ya ruru ab??, ya gwuru
Lekene nwoke na mma
? b? ogologo o toro ka ?n? nkw?
Ka ? b?z? ?t?t? akara chi jiri g?zie ya
Nd? be any?, a na-eked? oke ji n'az? ?ba?
? ch?? ya n'?gba mb?, ? h? ya
? ch?? ya n'ise ihe, ? h? mkp?s? aka ya
? nwaa ya n'egwu, ? h? na ? b? keleke
? ch?zie ya n'ihe odide, ? h? na ya na Achebe b? ofu nne
?r? mgbasa ozi b?z?kwaara ya mmiri ?ñ?ñ?
Af? ?ma ya na-akp? n'ala ka nne eke
? b? nwoke maara ezi okwu
?g?g? isi b?kwaara uhie ?n?
Oge ?b?la, ihu na-at? ya am? ka ?k?r? nnewi
Maka na ? gh?tara n'elu ?wa d?ka ah?a otu
N'ihi ya keduz? ihe mmad? na-echegburu onwe ya.
Nd? be any?, keduz? ebe any? ga-ebido wee g?s?ba
? b? nd? o mere eme ka ? b? nd? ? ka na-eme eme
? b? na nd? o buru p?ta ?wa
Ka ? b? na nd? ? r?taara onwe ya
N'eziokwu, a d?gh? ama ?garanya n'af? nto
Maka na oke ji n'abala ad?gh? az? ihu ?ba
Maaz? Chuka b? oke nwoke
Ka m ka gbado ya ebe a maka mgbe ?z?
Maka na oke mm?? n?kar?a n'?gb?
?m??kp? ekenye ya ?t?
©Izunna Okafor, 2018