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Valentine Okolo Poem
My love
I will not ask you
to be a pigeon or a dove
cooing your pleasures away
in our liquid moments of love.
I will not ask you to be tender
or to be a timid voice,
suspended in song.
If you must be anything, my Eve
please be thunder,
and shake the foundation of our union
with the audacity of your desire.
Unleash a cry from within
with a purity that vibrates glass.
Do not let your touch become ordinary
like words uttered without meaning or intent.
Do not be
a sapphire sky filled with birds in flight.
If you choose to be anything, my love,
let it be lightning.
Yes, be lightning,
and write your name across my chest
in fluorescent text.
Show me what it means
to be electrocuted by your nails.
Copyright © Valentine Okolo | Year Posted 2020
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Valentine Okolo Poem
For ‘Karim
“We used to have peace, but now we have only war.”—Halima
I will not speak of the dead
for that is another matter.
I will not speak of those
driven out of their homes
to find shelter in a camp
fenced with strings.
I will not speak of those
raped at dawn. Or of children
shot in the head.
I will not speak of them.
I will not speak of the woman,
round and heavy, like me,
who will give birth to a child she’ll be ashamed to name.
Neither will I speak of
a dozen other women, like her,
and a village which will beget bastards.
I will not speak of the slash—deep in my thigh,
made by a knife: a brand of ownership,
the mark of a slave.
No; on such matters I’ll be silent.
Rather, I’ll speak of warm fires. Of oases, dates,
and night songs.
I’ll speak of things that once were.
Copyright © Valentine Okolo | Year Posted 2021
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Valentine Okolo Poem
This is not poetry. They are my words handcuffed and carried away in black Marias by men who play gods with guns. And wearing the official uniforms given to them by those who rule, in order to protect the people. Yet, they choose not to protect the people. Instead, they extort money from them and have them locked up on trumped up charges, written on statements of air.
This is not poetry. It is the rage of wasted years. Of youths, considered useless by a system which murders their visions. And buries them in a graveyard of lost dreams. A system which leaves the youths to wander in the wilderness of uncertainty, unsure of tomorrow. Because for many of them, tomorrow might never come.
This is not poetry. It is the cry of the molested and the raped. The detained, and the sold. And the forgotten faces of those killed in regional genocides, without names and buried in anonymous tombs. Those whose names might never ring a tune. Because they are poor. And the poor are the first to be forgotten in conflicts. Because they have no money and no fame attached to their names.
This is not poetry. It is a memorial. For those murdered at the Gates of Blood. For those who came before us. And those who would come this way again. It is a memorial for all of us. For the living as well as the fallen. It is a collection of all our rage, hopes and fears. It is a memorial of what we are and what we choose not to be.
These are not pretty words. They are the truth. Unadulterated by years of fermented lies and deceit. These are the words whispered in married couples bedrooms. And shouted in bars by men who drown their troubles in bottles of drink. These are the words raised up in protests by those who refuse to be intimidated by bullets. And whose voices cannot be silenced.
Copyright © Valentine Okolo | Year Posted 2020
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