|
Details |
Damilola Olaniyi Poem
High, over the traffic
Free of worries
No cares, total abandon
The beating of fragile bones
Lulls me to sweet rest
Copyright © Damilola Olaniyi | Year Posted 2013
|
Details |
Damilola Olaniyi Poem
Heads...
The days of yore
Were characterised with:
Pizza and pop sodas
It was enjoyment galore
All the way through
It was good mood and sweet music
Wining and dining
Hosting and feasting
Pictures and picnics
Clothes and confetti
It was scarlet roses and scarves
Blue champagne and blue skies
Bubbles and bottles
It was luxury and laughter
Versace shoes and Armani bags
Diners and dinners.
...tails
Sour faces with broken countenances
It was hungered and starved
Sudden and painful
Pawpaws and bananas
Lux and Vaseline
Coca-cola and black skies
Phone calls and job hunting
Yaba clothes and Oshodi bags
Favoured and favours
Above all these...
Fasting and prayers
I pray the LORD turns things round!
Copyright © Damilola Olaniyi | Year Posted 2013
|
Details |
Damilola Olaniyi Poem
Rearing its ugly head
Struggling to take shape
The nincompoops’ have arrived
Yes, truly derived
The hyena’s abound
The terrain advanced
Abacha again?!
Leave us in peace
Abiola-like ears
When without my shears
Flapping without fears
Burger-like lips
Surely, the bill fits
Saddam hanged!
Terrorists ganged!
Youths hanged!
Petrol fanged!
Leave us in peace
230 victims, weighing a bale
Not enough to tip the scales
Burst! Yet another
Abattoir expects still more
Power maniacs at the fore
Obasanjo still snores
Leave us in peace
What difference was there
When Belleview happened
And Sosoliso followed
Killing a ‘fountain of truth ’
And National Corpers’ minus some
16 year-olds – buried?
1-mutilated?
And yet,
Chachangi became another toy: Unmaintained toy in acrid air
Toying with a 117 lives
Thereby burying that orange box
In Lisa village
Leave us in peace
Williams, Daramola, Ige
Maccido, Gandi, Mohammed
Hmmn…
The country mourned
But leopards remain spotted
Crocodiles without tears
And crabs, unblinking.
Atiku! Obasanjo!
National ‘craft scandals!
Political topsy-turvy!!
Economic instability!!!
Health upheaval!!!!
Physical and moral declination!!!!!
How much longer?
For we want to be
Left in peace…
Copyright © Damilola Olaniyi | Year Posted 2012
|
Details |
Damilola Olaniyi Poem
Heads...
The days of yore
Were characterised with:
Pizza and pop sodas
It was enjoyment galore
All the way through
It was good mood and sweet music
Wining and dining
Hosting and feasting
Pictures and picnics
Clothes and confetti
It was scarlet roses and scarves
Blue champagne and blue skies
Bubbles and bottles
It was luxury and laughter
Versace shoes and Armani bags
Diners and dinners.
...tails
Sour faces with broken countenances
It was hungered and starved
Sudden and painful
Pawpaws and bananas
Lux and Vaseline
Coca-cola and black skies
Phone calls and job hunting
Yaba clothes and Oshodi bags
Favoured and favours
Above all these...
Fasting and prayers
I pray the LORD turns things round!
Copyright © Damilola Olaniyi | Year Posted 2013
|
Details |
Damilola Olaniyi Poem
Dear Tracy,
I never expected you to go
Not even anticipated your leaving
I am disturbed by my lonesomeness
Wishing you as a true friend
Were near
I never thought to write letters
We just lived for a tomorrow
Not ever even telephoning
Popping in was okay
I never expected to hear your voice through wires
Never knew those plans were futile
Never thought we would weaken
Our heart of love
Never dreamt we would be season’s apart
Never did we dream of a yesterday
Nor licked memories bare
We never bargained for this
We never dwelt on reflections
My loneliness is obvious
I weep as I write
For hurt I was
When life turned sour
And bitter became I
When I knew
The power of love
Hate
Dejection
Loneliness
Memories
Aimlessness
Pent-up frustration.
If only memos kept!
Forever,
Comfort.
Copyright © Damilola Olaniyi | Year Posted 2013
|
Details |
Damilola Olaniyi Poem
I let the salt air
Just wash over me
And as I breath it deep
Into my lungs
I am transported to far-away places
By the rail
I see a mother
Occupy the centre of attention
And tell a story
To a captive audience
With two clothes
One around her chest, the other on her waist…
On the boat
I see traps and hooks
Pellets cast aside
By the wise fish
In red and white and green
These limousines cruise this green water
Distinct yachts’ of the ghetto!
I see the beautiful, the pretty
The observer and the observed
Little children in the sand
And semi-adults eating with their digits.
In the water
I swish my head
Back and forth
Left to right, right to left
And suddenly,
A water snake pops out its head
Smiling in delight
At the prospect of competition
On the fringes of my dream
I see myself
Drying out with a towel
I see this hydrophobic
Shaking her head like a wet dog
In this fragment of my dream
I am awake
But lungfuls of salt air
Still fill my airways
I breathe a sigh of relief
It was all a dream, I say
But sand sticks behind my toes!
Copyright © Damilola Olaniyi | Year Posted 2012
|
Details |
Damilola Olaniyi Poem
Shortly seeking to take you
As a witty in-law,
I am in anticipation.
Do you vow to:
Love and to cherish
Keep your sweetheart
Free of bruises?
Hold her in
Sickness and health
In wealth and poverty
Till death do you part?
My sister and her family
Come as one parcel
We sell not our daughters
To men of the night.
The night of your cross-over
The scorpions that sit on the road
Will be cursed!
The witch that holds the fallopian tube
Banished
The broken plates
Packed with a flourish!
That night of your celebration
I’m rebuking the okra
That will not draw
In Tosan’s pot (tafia!)
Cursed be the palm oil
That will not whiten
When bleached
Cursed be the tangled bedspread
To trip your legs
On your mattress!
Together, the gods will unite
In your case,
We shall blow the horn
Of joy
On that beautiful day.
As I eagerly seek to take you
As loving in-law
I am in haste!
Copyright © Damilola Olaniyi | Year Posted 2014
|
Details |
Damilola Olaniyi Poem
As the grass does not sprout
Without source, without cause
Then you did not come to birth
Did not exist without purpose
--for nothing .
Like talk, like play
You were born by man, borne from Jah
You are a gift from God
A gem among stones.
As inspired as your creator,
You are a blessing to man
Because you are unique
In your own way
And each time I look at you
Every time I see you
In my mind’s eye
I hope to emulate you:
The way you treat life’s burden
More like spice than bug
You truly are
A person lovingly spun by God!
Copyright © Damilola Olaniyi | Year Posted 2014
|
Details |
Damilola Olaniyi Poem
(For late Mrs Stella Obasanjo)
You are a paragon of beauty
Yes, a maiden of honour
Your steps are held true
In limelight of media
Your translucent fair skin
Held many an eye
Your strawberry-coloured lips
Captivated, salivated many hearts
An icon of substance
Of the Abebe breed
The worth of your simplicity?
In Aso villa lives.
You are a paragon of beauty
Yes, a maiden of honour...
The stronghold of that rock
The mother of all
Mother of few
The eyes of one,
All have eyes.
Tick-tock, tock-tick;
Your clock tocked at sixty
Sixty awesome years
Beautiful, inspiring ones
...your steps are held true
In limelight of nations.
One final TOCK shook Nigeria
Green-white-green
Lay still on the floor
Sixty seconds flat
Sixty awesome years
Dragging nothingness to your grave
O fair lady brave
Nothing did you crave
So much as perfect beauty.
Yes, a paragon of beauty
Truly a maiden of honour
Your steps are idolised
Sweet Obasanjo’s bride...
Copyright © Damilola Olaniyi | Year Posted 2014
|
Details |
Damilola Olaniyi Poem
The earth is standing
Upon its tail
I saw the chief Imam
Dash into the stall of the pork seller
Shouting "Hallelujah!"
The earth is tilting
Upon its axis...
Copyright © Damilola Olaniyi | Year Posted 2012
|
|