POEMS READ AT LOUDTHOTZ POETRY OPEN READING SEASON 9 EPISODE 4 SURVIVOR

TOLU DANIEL (IN GLASSES) IS THE WINNER POEM OF THE MONTH

SURVIVE - POEM OF THE MONTH

When the tracks of the rat race shatters apart

It won't really matter which rat was the fittest,

So, let us break free from our 3-dimensional world

Let us think outside of this global spherical box;

But first, we must let go of what is & reach out to what will be

For we aren't ready to dream ‘til we've closed eyes to things seen.

This world is led by pregnant men,

Not politicians with pot-bellies;

People who birth new habitats for the future,

And new worlds for their realities.

Therefore, mark these words:

Only such pregnant men will survive this world.

Tolu Daniel

///////////////////////////////////////////////////////

 “It’s an instinct”

Life begins as a race, you age with grace,

Boots are lace with pace, while you struggle to be at ace,

Our space in our place is void and empty, shallow in hope but deep with despair,

Nightmares are tales on walking faces,

Ideas baked in beautiful thoughts, served as empty dishes,

Dreams blown away by the brutality of reality harsh winds,

Feet swollen with trays of merchandise on Sun-baked brains,

Schools and Institutions drill gruesome pipes into depths of empty pockets,

Being broke is actually not funny.

It’s a survival of the fittest… But what if I ain’t really fit?

Don’t worry all hope is not lost; survival is the instinct code we live by,

It’s an instinct i have found in all.

Asapen

@Akinyemi Akinmusire

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////

I’LL SURVIVE

Again and again, memories of yesterday flashes my mind

Series of lashes and punches

Landed in coma, then passed on

I don’t know if this is for love or personal reason?

I’ve being surviving since then and will survive after then

So, I’m wondering why you want to follow the same road

You know I’ll survive with or without you

I can see you’ve made up your mind

Here is my little penny

If this is for love, please don’t do it cos I’ll survive

But if it’s personal, good luck

As for me, I’ll survive

Wale

//////////////////////////////////////

The Survivors

The Survivors

They say those who answer missed calls

shall be lost in a flash,

but we crossed the liquid mirror

and turned back into the future,

just to affirm that seeing is not believing.

There were casualties at the peace march,

so they buried the survivors in graves of dogmas

and camped the victims in sacred sepulchers of excuses,

somewhere on the wrong side of time.

Our earth is dying of thirst, but there is water on the moon,

tonight all we hear are the howling trains and the barking dogs,

.

 Soonest

///////////////////////////////////

Do not die

The dry tree

whose expected fall

defied all dreams

The leafless tree

whose seed outlived its stem

with nuts knocked into the drain 

Do not step on it’s tail

the cobra is only dead without a tail 

Do not die, no not yet

death is lived in life

and will certainly suffice for 'survive'. 

Chris ' n' John

///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

PENSIVE MORIBUND

Silence is golden; yet no more

Silence birth thoughts; thoughts that tortures the soul

Dark cloud looms; the sigh of death lingers

Shall I survive?

Tick says the clock; but death says the time

Hell freezes as I spit words of a bled heart

Shadows lurking like ghost of damnation

There is only this path before me; a choice made by the heavens

Can I survive?

Time draws to a close ; As the curtains falls on a lifetime.

My breath shall return to the nile

And the river of life shall flow in the faces of men

Then the streams of their mind shall listen to the deafening echos of my still breath

Saying, I am home in my mansion; I have survived it all

To die and to have embraced eternity is to have survived death

Emmanuel Ifeanyi

///////////////////////////////////

How short is Life?

Death is now a distant memory

For those who are dead

The life they live, we will find out when we join them

But not yet

I will survive here

Where we fall and learn from our failures

Being among the living not the dead who are living

I will die a thousand times not to die this one death

I will wear the mantle of hope in my heart

Love and then hope the sun rises in the souls of men

“Life is short”, they say

Be alive, survive

Ifeanyi Okwosha

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Petrified...

What could little Favour have done

In the choice of birth

Place and to whom?

Time and circumstances?

9 years old

Mothered 3

Victim of life.

If truly this whole existence makes sense

What could have been the sin of a 9year old?

Plagued by illness

Bereaved at dawn, dusk came too early.

-Amami H.

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Survivor Sonnet

Blighted wounds

Stolen arrows,

Bleeding suns,

Tearful moons,

Crying tempests,

We all die in our treacheries

Our nights yawn

For weeping dawns

And memories of perfidy

Continue to assail

Our wretched mortalities

We grieve,we groan,

Yet a survivor

Breaks dead hymens of sinful saints

Teddy Ugonna Richard

//////////////////////////////

The Edge

One last step at the edge, A man stands to fall.

At the brinks of moribund hopes he summons arousal of infernal replete.

He will taunt his sorrows in fated uncertainty, and laud his declension to lucifers lair.

One last step at the edge, A man falls to dust.

He flirts the silent dark and hopes exultation in the embrace of agony.

He will not fear the espousal of the soulless, neither the peace where bones rest.

One last step at the edge, A man dusts to triumph.

Though earth may rumble with repressed cries of despair, his faith will contest mortal thorns.

And as he becomes subdued by the tentacles of his fallible will he breaths, still.

One last step at the edge, A man triumphs to glory.

Night has befallen the heavens and the gates of damnation flood with this promise and a hope.

Like sunrise, virtue begets him from the shallow pits of the Forgotten to tell his story and a beginning.

From fall to triumph, and dust to glory A man is as he scripts.

Until A man dusks will he dawn; when his tale thus begin... I survived.

Segun Peters

////////////////////////////////////////////////

RIDE AND RISE

Are you defined by your skin

Or by what lies within?

Do life's stones cause your fall?

Or do you use them to build a wall

Or as stepping stones till you stand tall

Most smooth stones have survived beating

Sharp swords severe heating

So when your success story is told

There's likely been heat, knocks & even cold

Cats and rats may laugh at you

Snakes and wolves may try to get at you

But when riding a phoenix flames don't burn you

Erhio
///////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Sausage Roll

Not even the blisters can stop
The still strict sting on top
My tender skin
Pinned to a napkin

This matter
Is beyond 'go to the ants'
Even the ants need a wrapper
From this ferocious tyrant

That's how it rolls
Without sausage no sausage roll
To reach your goal
There must be loop holes

Tobi Best

////////////////////////////////////////////

   LIYA

I don't know about days anymore,

They all seem same.

I watch the world slowly each passing day, 

Through small circles of iron panes.

The dark has become so bright,

My rock of serenity.

My eyes no longer flash fear,

They got accustomed.

Times have become elusive,

They exist only in fractured spaces.

Here, I await my verdict!

My only crime- my faith!

 pricilia

///////////////////////////////

BLACK SOUL 

The blue looked upon the earth with disdain
As dead muddy faces glided on hope drained.
Many men survived the treacherous war
We mourn and set this cradle to the grave
Conquered in victory yet Found and Brave.
The center cannot hold they sing
Bleeding through eyes that see nothing

Pure black soul of rage and beauty.

We survived the Imposter after the rain

And a dreamy dance dawns, what a gain!

Raise these mending walls pure black soul

In your hearts where the sidewalk ends.
- Amar Basil

////////////////////////////////

FRENEMY

Just Like Jesus

I walked on the Mediterranean

To reach You, dear greener pasture

From Libya to Italy,

I became a prisoner of freedom

Just to see you, dear Liberty statue

Now that I am an “eternally” displaced person

I can concentrate on a Jewish identity in this camp

Maybe, Just Like Jesus I'd rise again

After all my dry bones had survived hell on Earth.

So this poem is for you, my frenemy,

Who coated life in the color of the rose

These words are an insurrection towards you,

Who never let me feel the gap between birthing and dying.

                    Lolade Oye

///////////////////////////////////

WHO WILL TELL US?

Who will tell them that it is not yet over?

Who will tell them that they could still crossover?

Who will stand in the gap and soak hope for them?

Who will tell them they could still see in the night?

Tell them in dirt we still find gems

In foolishness we still find wisdom

Tell them not to give up

Tell them dying is easy

Tell them they must survive

Chisom

/////////////////////////////

The big Sur

Free standing body of water

Lengthy coastline affixed to and totally unafilliated

Surnames- the name that comes after the conclusion of the matter- declaring paternal 

or familial identity

The name that comes after.

Like sur-viva!

The prefix before life

The life that comes after life happens

The happenings of life are a completely 

forgone conclusion

But those that live the life after life are 

those who are able to get out of life alive

Those who turn lemon into ice cold lemonade mingled with something abrading the throat, 

to make an aperitif!

 Andrew White