POEMS READ AT LOUDTHOTZ POETRY OPEN READING SEASON 13 EPSIODE 5 - SELF

WINNER POEM OF THE MONTH

I AM YOU – (poem of the month)

(a self-adulation series)

I am you

a steward of

time

 

and

that privileged vessel

called by nature.

 

I am you

a worthy whole of humanity.

 

We are more

we give lives

to the voices in our heads.

 

We are more

we birth lines

that glitters in your nights.

 

I am you

the curious wanderer

at home at every fort.

 

I am you

the reflection

of the sun when days are dark.

 

I am you

the golden ribbon

that beautify the moon.

 

I am you

in your burden

and joy of pulling through.

 

-Amami H.

 

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I AND MYSELF

Greetings my fellow sojourner

I guess that will be the greeting

Of the sun to the moon

In their cycle of give and take

I is, me that refers to

My head

My brain

My body  

My leg

The gift

The tool

Then who am I?

Where do I come from?

Why am I here?

And where do I go from here?

Questions that need answers

Indicating the binary state of existence

The Creator and His creation

The conscious and unconscious

I and my bodies

 

I have wondered

Yes! I have

This I, the self

Like seed must be fed

If it is to grow

Now what do I feast on?

What you sow in the table ever laid

 

Ifeanyi Okwosha              

 

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SELF

My knowledge of self 

Has fallen like a pack of cards 

That we keep the worst part of ourselves to ourselves is not a well kept secret

And when we say we don’t really know a person

It’s true 

Even a person doesn’t know himself 

Not fully

Not completely 

And

It’s because self is always evolving 

We morph into various versions of our selves as life presents us with experiences 

We keep the ugly parts hidden

Careful to flaunt the beautiful parts

We elevate our best sides

So that we can be thought worthy of love

eni a fe la mo

A o mo eni to feni*

Loving is harder because we never know who our bedmate truly is

A mind boggling thought if it is dwelled upon 

The core of self is vulnerable 

We only let our guard down when we trust

Even then we keep a little part of the unknown deeply buried

We chase validation

We fear rejection

To acknowledge self is to look yourself straight in the soul

And realize that you are just an imperfect bumbling unfinished 

Product

A work in progression 

A human just

being

 

 

Kemibon

*we know who we married but we don’t know who married us

 

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CIRCUMSTANCES OF REALITY CHECK

When you walk alone, on this earth.....
There you know who will comes and stay;
There you will know those who entitled to the course ;
Sometimes you have to run and see ...
Who runs to see what the cause ....
But the sweet sour response is that ...
At times , the ones we tend to see
Are busily waiting for where you will land
Or surprisingly there will be no one.
It is just yourself and self again.....

When you are left alone in the middle of the sea.....
There you will know the real fisher’s after you ,
There you will know the sharks and whales ;
There you will know those will come to your rescue ,
Those who will come with boats
Those will swim to your end.
But to your beautiful eyes;
Those you are expectant of
Are coming down with
Hook and line
You will know you only
Have yourself and self again ......


When you are left alone to fly,
There you will know those who are going
To pray for the sun to shine severely
There you will know those who.....
Will pray for your safe landing
There you will know those who are going
To shoot you to die.....
But to your smile
You will know your loved ones...
Are the ones who are secretly
Plucking your wings
Even getting your wings wet;
You have one true friend;
It’s just yourself and self again ......

When you are left alone in the darkest place
There you will know those who will come after you ;
There you will those who are going to shout
Your name ;
There you will know those who are going to
Lit up their lights to find you
But to your eyes
There will be no one
Not even the one who promised you
Security
It just you and yourself ........

When you left alone on earth ....
When you are left in the middle of the sea .....
When you are left alone to fly ....
When you are left alone in the darkest place ....
Be expectant of yourself rather than anyone
For this chess we all are playing ;
Is a closed but opened book.



Aba Absolute

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A SIP OF RIO 

 

I've told my story a thousand times

Didn't you read between the rhymes?

The lines you adored

Full of hints I poured

Into covered urns

Exposed my world

Go back and lift the cover

And you'll soon discover

Right there on your bookshelf

A story of a story within itself 

My dreams and cares

My hopes and fears

Hidden wishes

Favorite dishes

Everything

Yet Nothing

For I kept the key to myself

Which means to find it

You must be smart

And understand abit about my heart

But it's right there

In full glare

For the world to see

Everything you need to know about me

Bon appetit

 

 

Erhio

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WANDERER

They said time heals,

but pain is my nurse.

tired and panting like a chased dog,

I want breath as a baby wants milk.

How long shall I wait for the peace I crave for?

time will be the judge.

"Time?" I asked being curious,

Time is a liar deceiving most of us.

 

How long shall I be a wanderer?

seeking home like a lost child.

I feel hopeless like a desert that can't have rainfall.

Again I hope time will bring fortune,

but it is bringing torture,

I want break from life.

my strength is passing away with cloud.

 

Time is my oxygen,

but I have no idea of what is left.

how long shall it take to reach home?

only time could tell.

but I wonder if the oxygen remaining shall be enough to reach home.

 

Whatever the amount that remains,

I shall find a spot to take break from life troubles.

who knows someone might find me there and take me home.

and if not, I shall rest peacefully,and lie at a nearby spot just a bird does in its nest.

I worry myself not about what time brings me.

 

Elijah Akinboade

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YOURSELF

Don’t do this to yourself.

Don’t let this flood in your eyes wash away your joy.

Trickling down your face, with your pain afloat.

With the watery caress of a broken heart.

Let’s sail back on memory seas, we’d berth where you were still yourself,

When your smiles lit the dark and your laughter serenaded our ears,

When you silently danced in the joy of your solitude.

But now, you’re crowded with sad thoughts that have left you lonely.

Don’t do this to yourself,

Don’t shield yourself from a love that’s armed with fulfilled desires,

Let me shower you with affection to wash the pain away

And watch as happiness flows in again

Bayo

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SELF:

 

The selfie stick as a fashion accessory.

Failing that, the hooked hand that can click from any angle and post directly.

 

A sign and symbol

of this narcissist age;

this controlling zeitgeist.

 

The self- Id, ego, superego.

 

The conscious.

Self- conscious.

Subconscious.

Unconscious.

Super conscious.

 

Enlightened, illumined, energized. 

 

The self as a reference point-

my truth; calling things that be

as though they were not, 

in inverse faith- fluidity and relativity

in one fell swoop!

 

Overturning sociocultural

order on a puff of smoke,

a river constructed of spittle.

 

Self image.

Self awareness.

Self aggrandisement.

Self expression.

Self indulgence.

Self referring.

Self actualizing.

 

Give me, give me,

give me, my name

is Jimmy.

 

On to the point of opportunity

riding a dangerous wind.

 

The point at which the self surrenders, yields, submits and enters into the seventh day Sabbath rest of the Deity

 

Andrew Whyte

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THINGS YOU WILL MISS 

It’s not love if it doesn’t hurt

Real love is when you stand at the jagged edge of hope,

Sometimes you leap, sometimes you don’t

Sometimes someone catches you

Sometimes you crash

But Self-love is like when everyone is an alien

and you are space, everyone is distant from you

Though in space you never run out of things to discover

But then, you will miss the weight of things

You will miss the impact of things on things

You will miss the sun bathing of the tropical sun

In the smile of others

You will miss the sunrise of friendships

Because you are cocooned into yourself

 

Chisom

 

 

 

POEMS READ AT LOUDTHOTZ POETRY OPEN READING SEASON 13 EPISODE 4 - GREED

 

WINNER POEM OF THE MONTH

LIMITLESS SKIES – POEM OF THE MONTH

You may choose not to agree or see

The thin line between need and greed

You may think its mean

To consider needs as greed

Or the needy greedy

But it is somewhat tough

To know when it's enough

To know when to stop

When to hop on to the train of contentment

And leave the basement

That fine moment

You realize

You already have the prize

It's not about being frugal

Or placing straw on a camel

But at that moment

Needs dwindle

Dangling carrots get ignored

There's suddenly a limit to more

Debits become credits

Baskets become buckets

Cracked eggs make omelets

Rags get turned into puppets 

To see the thin line between need and greed

First picture how some seeds 

Birth weeds.

 

 

Erhio

 

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THESE CREEDS OF MEN

The unborn thoughts threaten our sanity

The air is thick with them

All the senses feel the tension

Every opportunity shows its fruit

As we plunge ever deeper into normalizing insanity

 

These creeds of men

Made by men

For men and their vices

They affirm it is in His honour

And lead only to Him

To give credence to their authority

 

The creed of men chose the thief

Their kind over the innocent

And still do the same today

The form changes

They change their cloak

They think they are wiser

As they head south

 

In creeds vast desert

There will always be an oasis

 

Ifeanyi Okwosha     

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*HUMANE HYPOCRISY*

A menace, a spiritual disaster.

Which human dwells in.

It is above conquest they say,

while it depletes humanity.

 

Fallen nations, Innocent deaths,

as a human find satisfaction

in his brother's asset.

Meanwhile, he has got millions of it.

 

Brothers of Joseph,

of the same blood and gene,

forsook their genuiness,

and embraced greed as a companion.

 

Actions birth reactions.

Greed birth conflicts with no resolutions.

A rich man in a mansion,

killed his poor friend over a land.

 

It is a form of passion,

as it drives its host crazy.

He drives hard to satisfy

the intuitions of the devil in the guise of exuberance.

 

Its cure sinks into Earth every second,

as humans fail to recognize its significance.

Even when they claim to have search its four poles

to no avail. Humane hypocrisy; a stale tale.

 

–JesusOfLagos

Akanle Jesus Abdullah

 

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BANDAGE 

I'm a man with damaged soul 

Breathing with a worse heart

Like old furniture 

Bless with the clearest biggest eye 

And unable to see the world 

When I have sealed in life prison 

Like caging birds 

 

Tapeworm termites and invisible wicked insects 

Were turning my body to their perfect home like Rome 

And bones to playing toy 

As the stunning moon insisted to frying me like suyar meat 

Life too playing me like soccer football 

 

Pundit

Yusuf Adisa

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LETTER TO MY FELLOW BLUE BUTTERFLIES

 this poem is water; 

an open letter

to the fellow blue butterflies

that fly on my head.

it's a letter; a poem

that soliloquies, &

reads the notes on our grief. 

dear fellow chained blue butterflies,

i read in the book

written by the fingers

of our grandfathers

that all the boys 

in our city were meant

to write memoirs;

memoirs on how they

enjoyed the wind

of our fatherland. but here 

we're, reading the red notes

that resemble my father's blood. 

& i asked the standing moon

of our galvanized homes. i asked 

the gallivanting sun on the men

who swallowed our land. all silent, 

afraid of being taken by rough

men. & the fearless stars

escaped the imminent sky

and said motherland’s eaten 

by the men we hanker to 

have our heads touched

by their cruel hands. 

dear pained fellow blue butterflies, 

it's now the beginning of the end;

the drum’s to be beaten, again.

remember, it's our fingerprints

that can give them another breath

that might rain us an acid rain, again.

Salim Yakubu Akko

 

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GREED

 

Saw a mad man smiling today,

There was a swagger about his feet’s,

He must have found treasure.

 

What kind of treasure?

An hidden buffet?

In cellophane bags

His treasure unfolds 

 

Grey headed bread,

Crippled sardines,

Lazy fruits 

Stuffs 

 

Saw a normal man today.

There was a drag on his step

Two daughters, Side by side 

He must have lost treasure

 

What kind of treasure?

A bundle of fame?

In cellophane bags,

His treasure missing 

 

Leaves from trees

trees called banks 

Can’t take note

Currency’s fool 

 

Blind to podium,

Olympic stands,

Of both treasures

by his side

 

Who is really 

really Mad?

 

 

AlexDeScribe 

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GREED

She is that woman in charge

Serving party jollof and meat

"Yes it's finished" she yells

But goes home with a black nylon

Enough to feed a community.

 

She is that woman in black

Soaking in loud tears for the loss

"He was such a good man" she cries

But reddens her lips with his blood

To amass  wealth, she killed him.

 

She is that woman in the office

Sitting in the heart of the governor

"You'll be richer" she whispers

Projects undone; hospitals dilapidated

Corruption blew a kiss to embezzlement.

 

She's that woman in church

Watching over the tithes and offerings

"Falsify figures" she suggests

Even God, Himself understands this

You eat from where you work.

Esther Okekwuo (REHTSE)

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GREED:

 

Pride, greed, lust, envy, gluttony, wrath and sloth, these seven in addition to their close cousins, sadness and vainglory.

 

But the one under consideration is greed.

 

A thing which drove Marlowe's Faustus, amidst all the confusions and contusions of life, learning and literature.

 

A subset of which is, making many endless books, which weigh down the psyche and the collective unconscious.

 

A doctrine of good greed as propounded by the Gekko of Wall Street and Ayn Rand's Virtuous Selfishness, which results in isolation and suicide for the rich and envy and murder for the poor.

 

At least, Dostoyevsky's peroration in the Brothers Karamazov drives that belief.

 

Greed is good by some reckoning, because it can serve some beneficial purpose in the context of motivation and inspiration;

 

making the push for better, bigger and faster  social and economic outcomes.

 than they have.

 

But greed is not good.

It is tripled with avarice and lusty epithumia.

 

Altruism is better, but has little or no sex appeal; no drive, no oomph nor charisma.

 

Declare your Jihad on greed and all it's relatives, seen and unseen, and then you can fully unleash all of your light, if I understand all that Al Ghazali is saying.

 

Greed is a torrent which overturns the good of life and derails the trains of advancement and development.

 

ANDREW WHYTE

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MEN DO CRY

 

Men do cry

For I know what the eyes of a father

Looks like

When they see

The shallow graves

Of their sons

Dug by greed

Greed is a lazy worker

With sparkling lights

And flurry sounds

But often dies before

The lights shine the brightest

Greed strips a man

Make him stretch out his hands like palm fronds

Swaying to every stranger

Gaunt eyes like the eyes of poverty

Non-descript

Empty

 

Chisom