Long Aftermaths Poems

20 years ago,                                ...

Read More

UNDERBELLIES


What underbelly is this 
          containing quiet grasping greed for
my magical sword gifted to me by St Michael ?
       What...

Read More

(Written by Mpho Leteng & Jennifer Legotlwane, edited by Onalethuso Petrus Ntema)

1. So you are still out-and-out with that old passion?
I look cogently at you actively warbling that song, unchanged, 
You sing out the aridity...

Read More

Stay
Go! I screamed. Leave!
Start spreading the distance between you and me.
Why is all of this happening so quickly?
Go, I roared.
Stay I whisper…Stay
As I watched you walk away.

White is black, black is white
I don’t care about...

Read More

A humanity Slain by a black ghost flame

Because their God was an unspeakable name

A Mournful, Insane, multitude with emnity and self induced labor pains

An Eon that has never awoken - A Copt of Souls- skin...

Read More

My demeanor, the aftermaths of recklessness 
A child once, a man to soon
The glory to my name gone, the grace faded
Change do I offer no opposition to 
Derogatory remarks, have I afforded restraint  ...

Read More

I can bring you a holy war. 
Of souls and sour things…
I feel your slings and arrows of poison sight!
I dealt with your Hypocrisy your lies, your bitter night.

I simmer in your black bile of...

Read More

All of the aftermaths occur after the wake of a bunch of terrible events: Hurricane
Katrina, the September 11th attacks in New York City, War in Iraq, and others. these types
of tragic events and a bunch...

Read More

Bathing with Bathsheba

By Mark D. Stucky
As you bathed bare below the high palace
were you intentionally seductive?
The citadel was in plain view,
and so apparently were you.

Or were you simply innocent,
and the king abused his power?
Was it...

Read More

Today I wrote a valentine to myself
Happiness as I sealed the envelope;
For to truly love', one must first love themself
I placed the valentine in the drawer of my vanity
Thinking I may need it on a...

Read More

My friends warn me
I’d warn myself
You’re a bad boy
Smoking, drugs, and tattoos
I couldn’t help myself
Tried to ignore the nagging
But baby it was just so much
Couldn’t drown the demands of my heart
Don’t know why? Don’t care...

Read More

AMASOWONMWAN

At arm's, I  am but your brethren, 
Ne pas comrade
Pour food, most have sold 
Their Honors for gold 
Others, a pot of pottage

The tree only bends to the wind
Because it doesn't know how to...

Read More

From lands aglow with carnige
To aftermaths of reconstruction
The frozen shock of human failure
Is won with great loss
My peace is won in policy
My peace is an armchair's comfort
But from violence of the flesh
To the nightmares of...

Read More

Cool May evening skies come as a surprise
  following several days adventures
  of record heat breaking temperatures.
and  as the brush of March retreats with temperatures of gathering heat
  relief comes unexpected...

Read More

Before the rise of the sun
 just before breaking dawn has begun,
shadows haunt the hallows unfreed
 where whispers slip in and out the trees.

The leaves step lightly along the paths,
 soon, the trees bare their...

Read More

Give peace a chance, will those of nobility declare
Intelligence of spirit, who could ever compare
Valiantly fighting the evil in the world, unwilling to fail 
Earnestly helping those needy, without ever becoming frail 

Peacefully sacrificing time...

Read More

Sometimes, I want to tell you.
Laying by your side, it’s a mystery to explain
Why I gave up my poetry for so long.

It’s a mystery to explain why I told you my mother is dead,
When I...

Read More

Some aftermaths burst unseen within,
as aftershocks of sorrow,
arriving as electric jolts
that crash through your skin.

Those shockwaves subside, twinkle out
like embers;
the Kleenex runs out, then you patch up
a memory
like a pair of jeans you cannot throw...

Read More

There is rumbling in the skies
It’s not thunder
Babies sound a chorus of cries
Where is mother?

They have mastered the drill
To take cover
Prayer the only sanctuary, they stay still
Survive or wander

There is no heat to keep them...

Read More

As His Young Fan Stood, Terror In His Heart

Coming home from war a different man
his only son, by far his biggest fan.
Yet horror of war deaths in his mind dwell
death of his brothers, war's mad,...

Read More

Each day presents a choice of paths
As we journey through life’s meadow,
Seldom do we foresee the aftermaths
Making our way in sun and shadow,

Knowing not what the future may hold
With certainty, we valiantly press on
Placing one...

Read More

Can’t help that I am dangerous but cautious 
Been in situations that left me broke down in this world lost in this 
Feel the pain that has drained my eyes peeled my skin away
Aftermaths of...

Read More

Lady, come and lay your head beside me 
let us share with the moon this secret idyll
see the shooting star carve sky with promise
as silvery light caresses soothing us

Lady, come closer share with me the...

Read More

Here I sit alone
Alone in the dark
No light anywhere
Not even a little spark

The lights went out
Halfway through the storm
Life tomorrow will be
Nothing like the norm. 

Hurricane Zeta
Came through with a fury
To the shelter
We must go...

Read More

i never become a victim of my trials' aftermaths
i choose to shake them all off and allow the calmness of my sanity to guide me
where that direction has taken me untied the noose that stunted...

Read More