From the far-flung reaches of the Sahel,
Where the sun kisses the earth and sets,
The land of Zulu, Opobo, Musa, and Mandela,
Home to Cleopatra and Ramses,
I bathe in the dunes of the Sahara,
Walking the path of the Masai Mara,
Climbing Kilimanjaro, swimming Oya and Osun,
All the way to the banks of the Nile.
I’m an Oba , a lost one in the wilderness of monumental slayer
I’m a man, a lion in the scorching Savannah
I’m a liar, living in Denial
In denial,
I rise, as the sun rises,
To live, as the lion lives,
To roar, as the earth roars,
To be free, as the Sahara is free.
Categories:
masai, africa, freedom,
Form: Free verse
When I stood my face, to steal a glance
You stood your face, to steal a glance
When I caught the thief, catching a thief
You arrested me, I chained you
The sun had just dropped, I had not eaten
My mother's full pot, but yawns and yawning
Turning myself eye popped, my skin bed cold
Through the black dark, cockroaches looked afraid
As the sun showered her face, I washed mine
I went into the Kraal, took my Masai and Simba
No time to eat gruel, to the gold field to mine
Again I saw you, how to let you mine
As you climbed to fetch, I said ouch!
As acacia thorns bit your knee, I said ouch!
Ooh, my African Rose, you kill minus swords
The gap in your mouth grains, way for laughter
The river in your creamery coopers, full of mills
The hill that follows you, whenever you move
The fibers above your height, not human fossils
Categories:
masai, beautiful,
Form: Verse
Indictment
They say it’s wrong to dream in Africa,
to win your heart is to lose your way.
Jungle overgrown, government overthrown,
Europe’s long drop, urinal of the U.S.A
No one wants you there,
nobody kicks you out.
Best to be a serpentine,
and snake your way out South.
Facing the equator,
you’re standing upside down.
High pitched music,
hide the truth lower down.
Only in killing fields,
does memory grow short.
Longing is taller than the ever leaping Masai,
dreamy warriors pleading for another way.
Hallucogenic cannabis, halleluia contraband.
a crazy little foot path,
Leads to unadvertised paradise.
The cynic and the sick,
meet the arrogant and the rich.
In hallways and corridors,
hospitals and whorehouses,
To sell our innocence and divide the loot.
a penny for your liver.......
a pound for your heart......
look away Dixie land..... look away....
This dirge is for my country,
my lamentation lasts all the day.
This river of tears just flows along,
before she melts and disappears,
yea, before she dissipates into an ocean gone wrong.
Categories:
masai, change, deep, poetry,
Form: Dramatic Verse
worn like a killer bite around the neck
It breathes in unison with a heaving chest
offers protection like having eyes on the back
of the head like an invisible shield in a clenched fist
it now lives on through the soul of a Masai
the only skeleton in the wild never approached by a vulture
it is at the heart of the pride of a Zulu warrior
there’s no greater, more fearless culture
it hangs as a symbol of courage next to the heart
sharp and ready still to tare flesh from bone like a spear
wielding its fury in spite of mouth and jaws, still a beast
it would be the last gasp its victim souls ever hear
a roar like the voice of the gods, the command of death
echoing tremors across the savannah
the thrill of the chase, of the hunt, of power and stealth
the eternal strife, of the nervous chuckle of a hyena
it remembers how it instilled fear, how the wind caressed its mane
how claw and tooth worked together to bring down wildebeest
there’s no middle ground in this life, in the world of man
only the insatiable desire to rise above the rest, to be the best
Categories:
masai, africa, courage,
Form: Rhyme
SUNFLOWER
All yellow and big and radiant
Commanding a tiny city centre lawn
Looking top heavy and a little nervous
Bright smile at all the sullen passers-by
All too hot and hurried to notice her
Holding tightly to her pole
A tip-toe ballerina swaying minutely
A proud one-leg Masai with a spear
Looking directly in my eye and saying
You’ve never seen a flower before?
Too busy to stop and chat?
Ok, go on by, but remember -
This garden is mine, and I rule here.
Categories:
masai, flower, metaphor,
Form: Imagism
Masai Mara Migration
When Mother Nature calls
A wildebeest then recalls
Yonder, to migrate en mass
In search of Greener Grass.
Great a Hand that beckons
Utopia is yonder he reckons
Perfect is the Clock of Time
Telling of the right clime.
Behold, the forest on horns
Jutting like stirring thorns
Lank calf on mother’s tow
Alert not to lose the cow.
Bliss is calling I can hear
Who would not brave fear
To ford the River of Death
To the calling Land of Mirth;
Survivors of the long trek
Or, Croc’ menacing wreck
And prowlers in couchant
Intend for an easy hunt....
Verdant Land that waves
Leaves on trek many graves:
To gain a thing though small
You stoop to give your all!
** An epitome of the Diaspora and Africa’s Forward March into Liberty and Economic Emancipation.
JM
04th Nov’ 2013
Categories:
masai,
Form: Couplet
Masai Boyfriend
I’m in love with a Masai Boy
Tall sable-skinned giant.
In hand, a stick his joy
Smile; true lips of a saint!
Wealth: bull, cow and calf
Safe from creatures feline
Identity, not Masai by half
But, nomad of a royal line.
Sceptre; his wooden sticks
Royal Cloth, the red robes...
Savouring gore with licks
Logs stuck in his earlobes.
“Stands with imposing height
“Scanning the Masai Mara
“On a leg of striking might!”
So writes his lover Clara.
“High Jumper of renown,”
Again, she sent the tweets,
“Sound sleep have I known
“He jumps inside sheets!”
**With Love & Respect for the exemplary fortitude of Kenyan Cultures, whose “imposing height” (evocative of the Masai) is a pride of Human sanctity.
**The Poem is a reflection of, sometimes, a cross-culture and cross-racial marriages that, despite diversity in norms, may bestow a fantastic experience and everlasting bliss.
**With happy memories of my Friend, Gerald Kithinji, a Patriotic Poet of Kenya (his beautiful Homeland.)
JM
02nd Nov’ 2013
Categories:
masai,
Form: Quatrain
Our father’s dying...............
The sky is crying plays the background to my tears.
Our father’s dying................
The sky is crying plays the background to my fears.
Our father’s dying...................
That most precious, wonderful, decent man is dying.
The sky is crying plays the background to my tears.
Please do not take him before the summer sun
has once more on his roses shone
and another winter been and gone
but when you must
‘ashes to ashes
dust to dust’
Let the dark river Styx softly bear him
upwards to the river Nile. May he lie
afloat on dreams to where cicadas sing,
rocked tenderly beneath African sky.
May he drift on towards his younger days
Striding once more across Africa’s plains,
where eagles fly and Masai cattle graze.
Then home to hear our mother call his name.
Let her greet him in floral fitted dress
and walk with him where Jacaranda grow.
By sweet jasmine may they warmly embrace
and his failing heart with new strength over flow.
May they dance forever when the day is done
Young lovers entwined at the setting sun.
Our father’s dying...............
The sky is crying
plays the background to my tears.
Categories:
masai, father, fear, hope, loss,
Form: Free verse
Proud daughters with an ancient regal look;
Each undulating move is like a kiss.
They open up their beauty like a book -
In righteous, rhythmic, syncopated bliss.
Erotic ebony gives sinful shine
To skin that glistens bright the night unique.
Obsidian, delightful cherry wine;
From transubstantiated Mozambique.
Her stride is like the river as it flows;
She moves with prideful beauty - statuesque.
Oh lady Africa your passion glows
With lust imbued by rippled arabesque.
So sleek and wet her silouette goes by
A royal beauty born of great Masai.
Categories:
masai, passion, beauty, beauty,
Form: Sonnet
I have lay dormant for too long now
slept in the shadows,undiscovered.
Until the all knowing mind and
excited eye of a Masai shepherd
extracts me from my mountainous shell.
From ultramarine to lilacy violet,
christened the Blue Zoisite
Adopted by Tiffany who cried in despair
'It sounds too much like suicide'
Renamed Tanzanite, after its origin
a most precious, unique purple gem,
or am I, not purple but yellowy-brown
A lavender hue,some might claim.
A newbie compared to the oldest of rubies
a rebel that will not be mined.
Immaculate elegance, exclusively
the most dazzling of earthly designs.
27th July 2011
Categories:
masai, nature, science,
Form: Free verse