Maya carried fire in her
Throat.
And elegance in her traverse
The kind of woman who
Could
Burna truth into the world
And still leave the room
Sensing like grace.
She didn't raise her voice-
She raised her standards,
Made people checked themselves
Before they nudged her name.
Her words walked in heels,
Her presence walked in purpose,
And her silence
Could humble a whole
Assembly
Without breaking a sweat.
Maya taught us
That class isn't softness-
It's Discipline,
It's dignity,
It's knowingwhen to speak
And when to let your legacy
Do the talking.
She lit fires
Without burning bridges,
Told truths
Without losing poise,
And rose
Without stepping on
Anyone
Who wasn't trying to hold
Her down.
And me?
I honor her every time I write
With backbone and polish,
Everytime I let my fire
Show
Without it scorch my class.
This is my ode-
Street rooted,
Fire forged,
Class carried-
To Maya Angelou,
The woman who proved
That rising
Is an art form.
The tabby sits back with his cigarette,
smoke curling like a lazy question
over the white cat stretched on a pillow.
He taps his Injecta pen,
studying her pale tail, her unmarked back,
as if imagining stripes is half the art.
Some identities are borrowed, he thinks,
a little ink, a little imitation~
nothing too serious, just a soft suggestion
of who we might become.
He draws slow lines,
letting his own bold markings guide him,
letting admiration slip into mimicry
the way cats copy each other’s confidence.
The white cat doesn’t mind.
She purrs at the attention,
at the small reinvention blooming on her fur,
at the notion that change can be chosen
or simply offered by someone
who believes nature can be nudged.
He leans back, his cigarette glowing,
and wonders if every creature
carries a stripe or two
inked by someone else~
or added just for fun.
I felt the tug, the loosening air~
Oh joy! I drift without earthly care.
I popped free with a laughing spin,
a tiny pilgrim, born of wind.
My comrades joined—what giddy glee,
dancing like colorful confetti spiritually.
The autumn breeze nudged us in its stride,
we somersaulted, tumbling side by side.
We skimmed the lakes, pirouetting on our way~
a drifting troupe, an autumnal ballet.
We rode the rivers, wild and free,
a giggling, leaf-born odyssey.
The wind grew hushed; our laughter stilled~
as though some deeper call was filled.
We felt the earth’s slow pull begin~
God’s summons soft as whispered wind.
We settled down in muted grace~
content to fade, to feed this place.
In the middle of trading tense Nasdaq futures,
My cat scratched at the bedroom door
And came to find me.
Outside, it was a season of heavy, falling snow.
Oh my!
The cat was dozing peacefully on my chair,
Drunk on the lingering scent of my body.
I gently nudged the cat aside with my hip to sit down,
But its tiny body was so incredibly warm.
There was absolutely no need for a heater in the room.
And just like that, I suffered a beautiful burn
From that sweet, sudden warmth.
Meanwhile, on the monitor, the Nasdaq futures index
Was already burning up in flames.
The very moment I lost my grip and missed the loss-cut line,
My cat stares at me with the most pitiful eyes.
“Aeyong—”
‘Well, human, looks like you won't be able to buy my kibble tomorrow!’
‘I can starve tomorrow and endure the hunger,
But you better clean up my poop from the litter box right away!’
“Aeyong—!”
I sat all alone in darkness as if tethered to this chair.
Light enough to see shadows. My fear was hard to bear.
They were trying to be daunting, their haunting profound
as they kept taunting me. Their faint whispers the only sound.
I begged them for silence, the specters without faces.
Constantly circling, creatures who wore black carapaces.
They frigidly nudged me, chilling the marrow in my bones.
Never before had I been more frightened than I was here alone.
In the hush of darkness, I trembled trying to speak.
A tear has escaped my lashes and rested upon my cheek.
Thoughts from my past were regrets my mind tried to chase,
searching for the wounded part of me my heart wanted to embrace.
I broke the silence of the night and set myself free
by rippling like a wave that found its way across the sea.
I chased the beastly shadows, trying to feast upon my soul
and illuminated the night when I found the courage to take control.
It takes a while,
time gets trapped behind closed doors,
mice need to be nudged into awareness,
whiskers electrified.
A sleeper adjusts its mouth,
for often lips arrive
behind a scream.
The brain is now ready for its screenshot.
The body stretches to a window,
neuronal mice
pull upon somatic ligaments,
yank upon slabs of connective tissue,
slowly reshaping a new reality.
Unfortunately,
you are not exactly transferable,
you can’t get on the same hamster wheel.
A new you must be rehabilitated,
the world also must be trained
to accommodate this au currant -
this avant garde prototype
of an old guy.
tastiest starches
sour cream friendly
buttered and salty
twice baked with sweet cheese
nudged next to steak
dug with a hoe
straight from the ground
peeled and sliced
potato soup
mashed and smashed
with gravy
potato
French fries
tater
spud
As if our fights were not fractious enough,
Look, children have picked up the cue from us
And unless we call truce for peace and love,
Things might blow off the roof what with all fuss,
She complained once, nudged by the lost out sense.
Relax, I said, a conflict has its use,
So has this friction if confined to fence,
Only, it’s a double-edged sword to choose.
Life, what an opus if fights forge out friends!
Thank friction, a caveman found out the fire,
Stop all chafing, wheels would go out of hands,
It can lift humdrum life a tad higher,
It’s friction that dull edges get vetted,
Without, bonds of ties get not well-knotted.
If friction does within fixed fulcrum lay,
But not, were it to rub in a wrong way.
__________________________________
Sonnet | 01.01.2026 |conflict/friction, family, marriage
Note: This sonnet should have ended by the fourteenth line, but for the fact that every wife enjoys her birth right to have a last word, and here she insisted on adding her own couplet.
I blew out the candles
Someone nudged me and uttered, 'That's another 1400% of bacteria.'
I said, 'Everything's about opinions, innit?'
My friend showed me his coding work
Squiggly lines all over the screen
I said, 'I really don't care.'
We went to see the stage play of Murder on the Orient Express
The following week my son told me,
'I feel like I might be murdered any second.'
Door knockers are pretentious.
The Christmas tree stands
Ready for the lights
Then some ornaments
To place on branches
The large ones and small
On the low branches
Ornaments are placed
Now enter- Stormy
The blubs she bats
Slow with her front paw
The low ornaments
They are removed
Now paws the tree skirt
Is removed from the tree
The floor is bare now
Now she chews the branch
Shei s nudged away
It makes me wonder
Why stormy did this
I ponder my thought
What the reason is
Her first Christmas tree
I ponder my thoughts
This makes sense to me
It is the first Christmas time
She saw a Christmas tree
Four voices whispered through paper-thin walls,
A thousand dreams inside me called.
I didn’t know what songs could free,
But something sang inside of me.
The drumbeat nudged my face to try,
To imitate, joke and make them cry.
It grounded stories, sharp and smart,
And settled deep within my heart.
The bass hummed low, it moved my feet,
A steady pulse beneath the beat.
It pulled ideas into line,
And taught me patience, over time.
The lead guitar blazed a fiery call:
“Erase the line called usual.”
I pulled the strings and buckled up,
And took the leap toward stand-up.
The vocals rose, my heartbeat stopped,
My thoughts froze still and worries dropped.
They turned my feelings all around,
And finished songs I now sing loud.
A complete surprise, the message came through
“My friend I’ve something to share with you
I’ve written a song, and I am so proud
Would you like to hear? Turn it up loud”
Immediate reaction - that’s not your voice
The music, so polished; A.I. made the choice
The words may be yours, and the words are true
So what do I say now? What do I do?
Cos I believe music should come from the soul
Deep and meaningful, a laboured over toll
A computer assistant used to emulate
Trained on the generic styles that dominate
My friend I am happy that you are so pleased
If it helps you express yourself, then it is good indeed
But you’ve played a game, used an app, an A.I.
The creation is lost, a facsimile, a fake I cry!
Maybe I’m fast becoming obsolete
For believing as I do, (do I hide some conceit?)
My old songs sit forgotten and covered in dust
But A.I. can’t have them, I just do not trust
Where is the line in the creative process?
How much credit can you take for the success
Of a song or a story which you merely nudged along
And A.I. is always right, even when it knows it’s wrong
Apprehension a nasty culprit
Putters outside my window, that mud pit
Pulls, tugs, draws inward
Rushing towards scarred vineyard
Emotions fresh, newly healed over
Hoping to not once again spillover
Every time my being is hit
Nudged to stir emotions by some half-wit
Somehow, they stick in the knife and turn
Impale the tender taciturn
Opening the door to boiling emotions
Notions leave, fill me with Holy Spirit's devotions
I never liked loud noise.
As a child I would run inside
terrified by the sound
of an aeroplane flying overhead,
cower under the wrap
of my grandmother's thick coat
on the rumbling roar
of a passing truck.
There was always menace
in sounds that exceeded
a threshold which for me
was barely above that
of the spoken voice. Even then,
crowded spaces chorused
in talk would smother
and send me into panic.
I liked soft sounds
that came gentle to the ear.
Rainwater whispering in gutters,
leaves rustling in a light wind,
noises distilled to a murmur
when filtered by distance.
I liked the volume
of being alone.
Not much has changed.
The loud noises that manage
to penetrate an aged ear
still raise the heart rate.
Crowds still press their panic.
Now, at night, I like listening
to the stars and clouds nudged
by the wake of a passing moon.
wri
ting is
knitting
your life
thro ugh
a nee dle
and if
you sew
emotion
secret
you’ll
get
nu
dg
ed
a
w
e
e
n
s
y
Writing is knitting through the needle if you sew emotion, secret, you'll get nudged a weensy
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