I saw you with wings stretched, emerging from a suburban cocoon
with pride in your breath. I recall the times when we were closer than the spaces between atoms
closer than any analogy of distance
and I saw my future through telescopes with your eye at the other end.
All I needed, rather wanted selfishly
was to be asphyxiated by
Forsaken Knowledge
.
It was the golden age of knowledge;
It was the era of pyrite lies.
For all the feats and legends of man,
Faith marked their sullen demise.
.
Many millennia of war and conflict
Waged to determine whom was right.
Civil nations forced to heel and crumble.
The cruelty of man measured in might.
.
Victors skew
In after-time, a sage of mickle lore
Yclep’d Typographus, the Giant took,
And did refit his limbs as heretofore,
And made him read in many a learned book,
And into many a lively legend look;
Thereby in goodly themes so training him,
That all his brutishness he quite forsook,
When, meeting Artegall and Talus grim,
Fair river! in thy bright, clear flow
Of crystal, wandering water,
Thou art an emblem of the glow
Of beauty — the unhidden heart —
The playful maziness of art
In old Alberto’s daughter;
But when within thy wave she looks —
Which glistens then, and trembles —
Why, then, the prettiest of brooks
If I met Charley I probably would have smashed him in his over sized snozz
Like a scene ripped from the reels of Barfly yes indeed we would have bar fought
I would have clobbered that big smug ugly b*st*rd with my big chubby ham club
Solely in an effort to sober him up for a moment
Only because he
Helen, thy beauty is to me
Like those Nicéan barks of yore,
That gently, o’er a perfumed sea,
The weary, way-worn wanderer bore
To his own native shore.
On desperate seas long wont to roam,
Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face,
Thy Naiad airs have brought me home
To the glory that was Greece,
And the grandeur that was Rome.
I see thy smile; at times, May’s warm, young sun,
At times, December’s cold and threat’ning sky;
Thy woman’s hand aplucking at thy sword,
The lightning lurking in thy deep-set eye.
Alone, thy face a stage whereon doth play
Ambition, Hate, Lust, Murder; flitting out
And in the gloomy wings of thy dark soul —
A fearsome and a most
How I hail this morn’s appearing!
It will thee, my love, restore:
Safety danger past endearing,
Sure we meet to part no more!
Fame is thine, lo! crowds aver it,
And her smile is dear to thee;
But I charge thee, don’t prefer it
E’er again to home and me.
BOOK I
Deep in the shady sadness of a vale
Far sunken from the healthy breath of morn,
Far from the fiery noon, and eve’s one star,
Sat gray-hair’d Saturn, quiet as a stone,
Still as the silence round about his lair;
Forest on forest hung about his head
Like cloud on cloud. No stir of air was there,
Not
Ukwa killed Nwaka Dimkpolo
E-e Nwaka Dimkpolo!
Who will punish this Ukwa for me?
E-e Nwaka Dimkpolo!
Matchet will cut up this Ukwa for me?
E-e Nwaka Dimkpolo!
Who will punish this Matchet for me?
E-e Nwaka Dimkpolo!
Blacksmith will hammer it for me?
E-e Nwaka Dimkpolo!
Who will punish this Blacksmith for me?
E-e Nwaka Dimkpolo!
I wasn’t able to comprehend
what was happening to me
and the air of melancholy
that was wrapped around me
Everything was in accordance
but still, my mind tossing
my ear filled with buzz
my heart left with flowers
that no longer blossomed
There was nothing left that could soothe my soul
Even the moon that once used to answer
Two Ants climbed into the cup.
Who is going to sip first? That’s a prenup
A cup filled tea in a cup leftover
Mosquitoes are eyeing, staying hover.
Sipped by a human, the taste didn’t match
Let’s not swim in, start from the patch
the tea must be short of its gingerly nature,
or the flavours felt short, lost their stature.
The milk must
I scarce believe my love to be so pure
As I had thought it was,
Because it doth endure
Vicissitude, and season, as the grass ;
Methinks I lied all winter, when I swore
My love was infinite, if spring make it more.
But if this medicine, love, which cures all sorrow
With more, not only be no quintessence,
But mix’d
Ah! Namu-sayers!
At this time, kolas had been sent out for a wife for Kambili.
And what was Kambili’s first wife’s name?
Her name was said, Kumba.
They tied up ten kolas,
And went off to marry the beloved Kumba.
And brought her and gave her to Dugo’s Kambili.
It was the way of doing a marriage.
(Man, pay attention
A Story from Boccaccio
I.
FAIR Isabel, poor simple Isabel!
Lorenzo, a young palmer in Love’s eye!
They could not in the self-same mansion dwell
Without some stir of heart, some malady;
They could not sit at meals but feel how well
It soothed each to be the other by;
They could not, sure, beneath the same roof sleep
But to each
he played,
And gleaming fingers touched the keys,
As if upon their souls she played,
While the mad desire grew fierce to seize
Them in the Bastile, swiftly made
Of my strong hands.
She played,
And o’er white shoulder flung a look
That almost drove me mad with pain;
My love ran toward her as the brook
When bank-brimmed o’er with
Beggar,
There he stoops all day,
Wrinkled,
Grey-haired,
Senile,
With his stained beard, and his pavement bowl,
Hand hopefully outstretched,
Entreating,
Entreating with his eyes,
Entreating with his tongue,
Entreating with his hand,
Yet we saunter by,
Eyes earthwards riveted.
Sometimes a gnarled stick,
Sometimes none,
Always the filthy kanzu,
Snow falling on China’s land,
Cold is blocking China…
Wind,
Like a wailing old woman,
Closely following
The claws stretching with cold,
To clasp the clothes of passengers,
Endlessly prattling
In words as old as the land…
You, China’s farmhand
Emerging from forest,
Driving a cart,
“As I lay in my bed slepe full unmete
Was unto me, but why that I ne might
Rest I ne wist, for there n’as erthly wight
[As I suppose] had more of hertis ese
Than I, for I n’ad sickness nor disese.” – Chaucer
What is more gentle than a wind in summer?
What is more soothing than the pretty
The clanging fire-bells shook the air,
The maddened crowd roared like the sea
And hurled its human waves ‘gainst me —
Then through the smoke a face gleamed fair
A moment brief — and then the crash
As chariot wheels together dash;
Mad horses rear and plunge and scream —
It all comes back, an old, old dream,
The brutal
