Journey,
Hurry.
Driving,
Striving.
Hostels,
Portals.
Hold raft,
Hard graft.
Giant,
Tennant.
Blinded,
Blighted.
Circe,
Tricky.
Swine herd,
He heard.
Circe,
Sleepy.
Prophet,
Home set.
Hades,
Tight squeeze.
Converse,
Reverse.
Stop-off,
Gods’ shove.
Birth place,
White lace.
Suitors,
Looters.
Disguise;
My eyes.
Deceive,
Relieve.
Kill all,
Wife tall.
Freedom,
Kingdom.
Love will,
Prevail.
Your City
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Seven Emerald Hills
Seven emerald hills rise steeply
From restless waters born of moving ice
Siblings of a greater peak
Lifting up their faces into rains of shrouded mists
Or bathed in welcomed sunshine
The First where stately mansion homes
Climbed to heights now holding healing hostels
Looking toward a Beacon,
Watching Rainier’s changing face,
Holding hands, across a valley cleft,
With the West where Alki shores
Welcomed the first footsteps of settlers
Looking across blue waters where ferries play at
Mistaken Magnolia blossoming with madrone
Not bowing to Queen Anne, counterbalanced,
Winking at Capitol, with shady streets
On a broad way above the lake
Looking north to find a learned Crown
Mourning Denny’s passing
Where offices now scrape the sky
Remembering a Yesler skid row, algorithms,
A pioneer square, a needle touching space
Slumbering in the shadows of a Sunset
Where seaplanes play with seagulls
In summer Seafairs and rain festivals January to December
Welcome to Sapele, a small city
In Delta State, Nigeria to be precise
The land of rubber, timber, oil and gas
The land of tourism
Once the most peaceful city, now terrifying
Once resourceful, now lacking and slacking.
No infrastructure, but so many hotels
Girls reside just like hostels
For prostitution
A city filled with corruption
Boys carrying out atrocity
Because of instability
Disrupting the city, causing insecurity
Just to live impressively
So many graduates without occupation
Poverty is the mother of crimes.
Camouflage everywhere
Trying to prove them competence
Over evidence
Beating and harassing
Whosoever don't go their way
But they've never apprehended a criminal
Steadily oppressing and collecting bribes
Just to feed and defend their tribes
Now you see a black man
Enslaving another black man
Just to feel superior over the minors.
As nomads do, I travel far and rise
In realms where diversity intertwines.
To seekers in hostels, I do confide
That the pursuit of peace must live worldwide.
It's good to know that outcry still brings peace
When we respect each other's human rights.
At times, our conflicts advance without cease,
And the poor end up living in campsites.
In every heart, let human rights arise.
Lasting love grows as good acts never end.
Let's walk with care and keep all hope alive
Since warmth ends war when helping hands extend.
No matter race, creed, religion or need,
We aid human rights by doing good deeds.
Lumbar ladies stroll by as the night sedans plunder the ho-dad hostels.
Looking to find nothing except another dozing cigarette beyond the cadenzas.
Another hot afternoon in suburbia with the repeated barkings of a distant dog.
Billy boy in his red asphalt-eating machine turns the dial to San Bernardino.
There is cool music bobbing in the hot accepting winds, south of Dragons Head.
In smoggy Corona, the dizzy Volkswagens travel in circles like demented dogs.
Billy boy guns the engine as he and the Mexican chick cruise in a ’67 beetle.
They pass the Chuck Wagon, as Slim Harpo melts the sun with Little Liza Jane.
Traffic signals, and the elderberry trees, pretend to dance to the muted cadences.
The hot afternoon winds play their own love-games as Billy boy comes to a stop.
Brown-eyed señorita with long hair flowing tells Billy boy to turn up the sound.
‘Music is life,’ she says, as the red asphalt-eating machine turns left at 6th Street.
Lumbar ladies stroll by now as the night sedans receive the night’s embrace.
At City Park, Billy and his latin lady sleep soundly in the cottonwood darkness.
In my dreams
I'm always alone
on monorail subway platforms
on anonymous beaches
with crowds and sharks feeding
and I the only swimmer.
In my dreams
I'm searching
cold rooms and buildings
backpackers hostels
street people alleys
rejected by old friends
yearning for my lost love
who has been taken
by other women
he loves more than me.
If you'll indulge me, this short poem, based on George Formby's WW2 forces song, was inspired by my son;'s experiences of backpacking in India over the past month. In that time he met ONE other traveler that wanted to just chew the fat, have a chai and watch the world go by with. Every other traveler he tried to engage in a chat or some site seeing (and sight seeing!) was at best indifferent and at worst simply rude.
So for (most) of the backpacking fraternity on the sub-continent...
Bless'em all.
By The Didds.
bless 'em all! bless 'em all,
the boorish, and with minds so small,
gone to India, to travel and learn,
sat in their hostels avoiding sunburn,
never speaking to others at all,
as back to their smartphones they crawl,
There's no conversation, in the Indian nation,
By gap-yearers less than enthralled!
JACKIE OILY PALMS
I recall them days that i lived
at the east coast of Kenya
then a college boy
We lived at the hostels near customs
in a place near an animal orphanage
Hallers park- near Bombolulu town
Where coastal s loved to partake
sweet palm wine straight from
the palm trees all over the region
Me Georgie and Jackie
then best of buddies
went to try out the wine
Started out on the real wine
before they offered us 'cham'
claiming its oil from the palms
First taste i know its locally distilled spirits
very potent and lethal.. i edge my buddies off
but despite.. they decide to partake the spirit
back to the eatery Jackie now eating
from the dinning table apparently those
who partake palm oil don't need plates
Jackie following day too sick cant attend classes
we did-int tell him the secret that me and Georgie
threw up all we drank from our delicate stomachs
Brave Jackie held it in and Memo had to comfort him
..Sorry Jackie you have malaria fever and your so sick..hic..
we dint let go that twas the palm spirits haunting our Jackie
lewis k NYAGA
Here the clammy flesh
Of the hopeful worker
In a flicker found rest.
After a harsh crackle of muscle
On an acre of steel rails,
Here, he spent his thirst.
Never schooled worker,
Donkey pilgrim to a Mecca
Beast is despised.
At the kick of the factory clock
In cruel steel tents
In full blaze of the sun
You spilled sweat to the last litre,
Toiled, & tip toed
On Christmas in sunny shoes,
Starched ties & ashen shirts
Over a tattered tin of some stale brew,
One you took as a crew.
These hostels were built,
Says a school of thought,
To hat colonial guilt
Stuck in Buss System’s golden gut
Like iron filling clog a file till its teeth are sunken.
Old pastel flats, they plunk
Daily to frown at the pink sun
They do not shift till time’s finish.
Their sad-cherry has twisted auburn.
As lofty as they rise
They must sink into the soils
They so despise!
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