Despite It All…We Still Sail Onward
(Apropos Again)
Why have we chosen to wallow?
Despair. Listen to the ancestors.
They did more with less; we have more.
Fool! We have boots with straps!
Be aware of where they came!
Be not deceived and succumbed.
Be not a victim of self defeat.
Catch a tear and wash it back.
Crystal stairways always shatter.
Remember the Ancestors who had less.
Ye of little faith, know that the faith
Of the ancestors weigh heavily on the arch
Forever bending against the straight anvil
Of nullification and dissimulations;
Curving and bending to waiting justice.
Survival surrenders nothing to defeat.
Liberation is not given; but fought and won.
Tears and grief win not battles; neither does despair.
Audacious faith and flames of hope and redemption
Burn and desolate all fears of defeat and delusions.
Despite the roaring sea ahead, we sail onward.
Despite the holes in our sails, we sail onward.
Despite the waning winds, we sail onward.
Despite the empty belly of hell, we sail onward.
Despite challenging vicissitudes we sail onward.
Categories:
dissimulations, analogy, black african american,
Form: Ode
I remember pouring imagination into you
When as a child you sat awed for my stories
Today I read poems your heart brings to view
And hear the honesty only a child knows.
Woman, mother, wife ... the child has grown
Larva, chrysallis, moth ... the myth has flown.
You tell truth straight like arrow to the heart
I feel your words bleeding through my vein
Without crafty turns and dissimulations. Sharp
Knife cutting away compromise and conceit.
I know you where your feelings rise, smokeless
With panting predicates, painting plain pictures
I could not write, for you are much more fearless.
You drank mandro-bitta tea and licked your lips,
You stained desire with honey and fed drifters,
Your thoughts whisper to the edge of the sea
Licking the face of memory with pink evenings.
Do you not know white herons are not a cross?
That I love my hibiscus alone going red to gold?
You tell truth, because you see and look again
While I turn away to dream the deeper thing.
When the withered world is done we have you
The last loveliness, the dream unwithering,
Your imagination shimmering like a windy sea.
The last hibiscus on the stem belongs to me.
Categories:
dissimulations, tribute, child, dream, child,
Form: Free verse