Short Calabash Poems

Headless horseman finds calabash
Securing legend of never more....

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Stock Market Crash at Calabash

was in Calabash
they had a stock market crash
hit which was a smash...

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The world is a calabash of herbs
Some are bitter and often abhorred
Few are sweet and always desirable
For either case there is no foretaste...

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GOODNIGHT, MRS CALABASH, WHERE-EVER YOU ARE!!

Only us older folks would remember this Jimmy Durante saying he closed his 
T.V. show with every week.........

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Sweet mother
 Sweet mother
 With the only calabash
 that doesn't coagulate the milk
 or making it sour
 even if it stays
 from morning to evening
 then evening to morning
 its still fresh and warm
 ready for consumption
 if it wasn't of age
 i will have asked
 just once...

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When he sees 
That cameleon stops 
to change colour, 
tell him to check it proper 
may be his sight 
is not right. 

When she sees a cobra
Tell her to make hot porridge
In the calabash and 
carry it on her head 
She will walk in the jungle 
Like an African Queen. 

July 03/2023...

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~~~~~~~~~~~

The rains have come on another Fall wind.,
nostalgia, once gone, now creeps back in.

My cornucopia overflows with things Man cannot barter or buy. 
A hand to her hand, lover's sigh to wooed sigh.  


“Good Night, Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are" -Jimmy Durante...

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Calabash cracks
On the frond chair
Splinters

Black sash, then sparks
Tooth, bone and hair
Whispers

Patter-patter
Footfalls on stone
Midnight

Blood-moon and fog
Shadows haunting
Mist-white

White dress, bare feet
Root, foot… slipped
Whimpers

Neck and wrist slit
Wine of soul, spilled
Sputters

Dawn and duskblade
Spell rites fulfilled
Hunters....

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Take this calabash
And this pot ash
Overflowing with oil.
Read the pericopes
On the scroll
Bond in tiny ropes
At the quadrivial
Take them not trivial.
Here is this ligure
With it draw a unicorn figure,
Mystical creatures will
By your pass...Stay still
And let not your eyes
Unbelievable wear.
In your robe's reservoir
Is the dark mirror
Your guardian eyes
Into a new magical ardour.

23/07/2013...

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Two calabashes of milk
loaded ready for pleasure
dangling as ripe paw paws
swollen as tortured frog
are within immediate reach
I ask for a pint to remove thirst
but she tells me in the face
“You have hard brown teeth
your stomach is for bones
this milk is for the toothless
and those with tube stomach
go ask my father and mother
get permission from God
as from me, no access
calabash is for the elect.”...

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Back on Baker Street -
pulling on a calabash pipe.
Paganini and Bach stream through
a cracked third-story window.

The Merseybeat’s…
the disaffected Pink Floyd years,
Mary Jane brain, mulling over 
puffing magic dragons;
reading Sherlock Holmes
secretly.

Today, downloading
a picture of myself back then,
no pipe just a youthful smirk
as I strut down that busy road.

Sometimes I wish I still smoked....

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Silence stormed the house
As he entered with empty calabash
With its mouth facing the ground
And he could tell from the faces
Unanswerable stream of questions
Of those gathered to scoop soup
Whoever washed his feet at dawn;
Cleaned the face with calabash water
To pay visit to the sage’s kraal
And came back with empty calabash
With hands dangling like bull’s tail
Closed ancestors’ toothless mouths
Yawning to drink imaginary milk...

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we may have the blues
should stop then we will amuse
choose the proper shoes

read news page by page
when my bright mind may engage
could see cat in cage

constant covenant
good looks appeared prevalent
where ever she went

there had been much trash
we could see in Calabash
things may cost much and cash

saw pretty Persian
scattered in a dispersion
while on an excursion

had been escorted
became badly distorted
will be deported...

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If there was a love tree
I would pluck its mangoes
To lay in your lap
then rest my head

If there was a love field
I would plow it green
Then sow a kiss
to plant on your brow

If there was a love train
I would whistle a tune
Then hitch a ride
to your bare hug

How sad on the day
When a friendship ends
like a broken calabash
the pieces scattered

If only once I could
I would surgeon-stitch 
the dry brown leaves
to our dead love tree...

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Oh! Maiden
Pass you the men den
Where is your pride?
Flaunt it let it not hide
Oh! You have none
A stigma to be forever born.

Mother's warning not yielded
Father's cry was not needed
Once you were, a beautiful virgin
Now a useless bottle of gin
A broken calabash
How great was your crash.

Your friend's lure
Has no evidence of a cure
The man you trusted with your blood
Ran away like a plethora of flood
How do you fill this gully?
And your lost pride a healing?...

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From the simplicity of a straight line you originate,
Yet asymmetrical in shape,
Only your designer takes note,
Beauty of odd.

Eyes expressionless,
They marvel at how you conduct yourself.
You, they wish to compress,
Lips and tongues arid,
No echo of theirs to witness,
Beauty of odd.

Place your calabash on your head,
Walk back to your hut,
New news of you is to be told,
You have one thing left,
Your beauty of odd,
Only your designer takes good note....

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I thought I was to be part of the talk
Thought that my coming
Over was of talking it over
But it appear, she has it over
This time around, all by herself.

My views never needed neither 
Nor my looks never a factor
She had the calabash in her hand
IBK, had it broken before my arrival
Yet, she was all over me pleading
“Please, I’m sorry, hope I didn’t hurt you?”




Alayande Stephen T.
4.15pm
23rd November 2007

Still in the bus at Ijan-Ekiti....

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Love tears are sweet
Like honey liquor
Shed in happiness and murky moments
Inevitable like death in life

Parting paints painful patterns
On lovers’ hearts’ books
Love is so binding
Yet forbidding when heartbreaking

I once received a calabash
Frothing with love like traditional beer
From a skilled brewer
My folly drained it with a quick wish

I gobbled it with a gush
I wished for more
But the giver had fled
Left drunk in sweet tears of love...
Oh! She was never to return!...

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I 
stand 
at 
the 
road,
 i 
look 
to 
the 
right 
Nothing.
 I 
look 
to 
the 
left 
Nothing.
 I 
look 
straight 
in 
front 
Silence.
 I 
put 
the 
paper 
in 
my 
mouth,
 i 
recite 
the 
old 
spells,
 i 
walk 
on 
a 
little,
 i 
see 
a 
calabash,
 inside 
is 
a 
brass 
crown. 
I 
bend 
to 
pick 
it 
up, 
it 
says
 'NO 
But 
you 
may 
have 
six 
wishes.'

i 
say: 
' 
O 
crown 
of 
Gold, 
Give 
me 
money,
A 
wife 
like 
(Jeniffer),
A 
child,
Good 
health,
Success,
And 
finally 
be 
in 
Paradise....

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