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African Poetry with editor Vera Ignatowitsch

The Unreadable Dictionaries of Our Actions

 

We are the idioms of our time, our sphere,

for we belong to the same era and ecosphere,

yet we are like measly words whose ovaries

and gist no soul can establish from the glossaries

of our shady actions. The paths of our lives lead to ruin

as the world struggles with floods or lack of rain.

 

Our consumption patterns, our careless lifestyles,

our previous actions and decisions are our dirty files―

they should be our proverbs for posterity and stability

yet we fail to learn lessons from our stupidity

or from wise sayings. The paths of our lives lead to ruin

as the world struggles with floods or lack of rain.

 

 

Ndaba Sibanda’s poems have been widely anthologised. He is the author of The Gushungo Way, Sleeping Rivers, Love O’clock, The Dead Must Be Sobbing, Football of Fools, Cutting-edge Cache: Unsympathetic Untruth, Of the Saliva and the Tongue, and Poetry Pharmacy.

Sleep Through the Rains

 

When whirling winds snarl at your roof, baring fangs like angry

     hounds.

When ice balls and thunderstorm bark at you with utmost                 malignance.

When light gives way to darkness and it seems the roof over

     your head may soon yield to the menacing threats of                       lightning spikes and heavy downpour,

and then the warmth in your bowels seems to have joined forces       with your foes,

clawing your intestines, urging you to seek asylum and attend to

     nature’s call.

When night thickens with obscurity, oblivion calling at your

     door,

When it seems that morning may never return from exile,

Just breathe.

Close your eyes, savour the silence beneath the echoes of your

     sorrows.

You might sleep through the rains.

When you awake, it will all seem like a dream.

 

 

Darlington Chukwunyere is a Nigerian screenwriter and poet. He moved from Owerri to Lagos in 2016 when he began his professional literary journey. He co-wrote Gold Dust Ikenga which premiered in London in 2017 by Silver Achugamonye’s UK-based Silver-Globe Sines.

Diamond in Catastrophe

 

Over a dozen years of blood mixed with morning dew

Words sweet as the perfume of a minute

Sketching a vision into a mountain

Hallucination has now resurrected

A spot of tiny evil in green memories

 

Double blessing is a double grace

All arms of soli make fake promises

Pillars in malicious mockery like love of self-exaltation

Dark cloud has covered the sun in blasphemy

 

Calling young ones to the ground

Making the sun and moon count

As a broken leg fails in hypocrite’s

Blood, in fire like a prodigal soul

A stubborn heart and knees are easily camouflaged

with their permanent ecstasy

 

Corruption in their last drop of sweat

While blood cries for redemption

Dead leaves in great minds

Burn out senses like the empty air of unknown motion

Diamonds shall be paid in weight

 

For catastrophe no wind of blame shall breathe

Grace in full armour from head to toe

Sweet flowers for a sweet diamond

Pure diamond on a mountain higher than a mount

​

​

Pearson Lemani is a poet from Malawi.

On His Return

 

He stood so tall amongst the rest, almost perfect,

His eyes running about like some ball in their sockets.

He seemed to be paying attention; but not quite,

For I knew what he sought. Me ― his precious jewel ―

Or so he thought for two nights before he proposed.

I said yes; oh! I am not sure what I said

But in his heart he believed I was his for keeps.

 

So there he stood, searching me out among the crowd.

We had all come for the same reason, with tears

In our eyes as if we all meant it, wholeheartedly.

Well I sure did for I knew that the sacrifice

Which he intended to indulge in was for all of us

And the price was his choice; his decision, his life.

Like others I grieved and mourned him; alive.

 

With no special fanfare I had bid him goodbye.

Without any regards for I knew he stood no chance.

‘I will wait for you,’ I had said without meaning it.

I joined the crowd who saw the troops to the city gate.

I cried more when he hugged me for the last time.

Then I wished him luck as he got on the black truck.

 

Maybe I lost hope in him rather too soon but I waited.

‘How many months was it?’ Ten months, I guess.

I got engaged after the most shattering tidings came,

The troops couldn’t make it, they were ambushed.

I mourned him but not much, for I’d done it before,

When he’d stood in all his beauty on his last day,

So I married his best friend, my high school crush.

 

Today, with all my attention to the movie playing,

On my enormous coloured plasma tv, I rubbed my big tummy.

Then he walked in after the first knock, to my chagrin.

‘You’re dead!’ I screamed. ‘No, I live,’ he replied.

‘I was attacked, I survived. I’ve been in coma since.’

I wanted to hug him but restrained myself in time,

I am married to another now and have no apologies.

 

I guess he picked up real quick and withdrew a little

‘You look fatter,’ he said. ‘I heard you got married,

You couldn’t wait, I get that. Well, you’re still ever sweet,

Who is the lucky guy?’ he asked. I admired him then,

But not for long for then the door opened just in time

It was the answer which broke the camel’s back.

​

‘Oh! it’s you, I should have guessed. I must’ve ignored the signs

earlier as open and naked as it sat,’ he said to his friend.

‘You broke my heart, Keena. We could have been happy.

Married and perfect. I wish you both the best,’ he said

He didn’t move, ‘The thought of you kept me alive,’ he said,

And was gone like the wind leaving me mute and still.

 

 

Sarah Amuche Akpu is a Nigerian poet and writer with over fifty poems and prose of which some have won her awards. Her writing is diverse, and she has been writing since she was eight.

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Egypt of My Old Days

 

On a run that seemed so long — cut short —

I felt abandoned by those who birthed me.

Spending tireless days weeping

Under the hand that once tamed me

Now turned away and inflicting bruises.

 

I could call him Rameses

For countless back stabs he inflicted

On my bleeding body.

He drank all my milk and honey.

A bee inside a housefly skin!

 

He chastised me for crimes I knew not

Peeled me limb to limb like a potato

Roasted me on fire, knowing I’d be cooked

And cast grievous curses on me.

Decades later he danced to tunes of my victory.

 

Like iron ore, his iron smith hands

Carried me, summoned fire all over me,

Knowing not Goliath’s dagger was being crafted.

Decades after his curse, victory prevailed

Recalling the day I became a man at twelve.

 

Under the wrath of his majesty Rameses

A new dawn arose.

Wounds heal but scars remain

If only I had a script writer

To translate the Egypt of my old days.

 

 

Symon Maguru is a Malawian poet and journalist, born in Blantyre, Malawi’s commercial city. He writes about his experiences in life, culture and religion. He has been writing poems since he was 16 years old.

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