LINES AND VERSES

The youngster slouched in a battered old wheelbarrow at the corner would instantly clinch your attention. Head tilted forward, he snored noisily, and flies buzzed in and out of his wide open mouth, like air planes refilling for a hectic war. There was a frothy spittle line drawn from the corner of his lips to a repulsive whitish pool on his dirty, soaked collar. His eyeballs twitched nervously underneath the lids, and occasionally he would mutter unintelligibly, lapping out with his tongue, but too limp to move a limb – he was in paradise. The rest drank on, oblivious of their stupefied friend. A few yards away, their row of motor bikes queued up waiting for passengers. Meanwhile, the bikers fended off the sun under a zinc shack and drugged their brains to seizure. “I feel like flying,” a skinny slob, not more than seventeen, slurred as he puffed a purl of marijuana smoke into the hot afternoon air. “I too,” returned another in a hushed guttural snarl, “I can touch that rope....

As you cast your worries And pains on us To walk that path, long and narrow Spare not a tear for world of wicked intents But say to the council of silent observers, "I did my best, I gave my all" Still, pass not judgements to the hands That wielded knives For the day of contrition eludes such lives Yours were lives smoldered at prime Wasted, wasted, wasted in no time But, goodnight youngbloods with dreams In their mind, goodnight sweet promises Never to fulfill, for this Darkness is forced to your eyes Jude Ifeme Subscribe to POETICALLY SPOKEN by Email

When the west tired of Sadam’s follies They sent the bombers to smoke him out Told the world he could kill the world “Come look at my backyard,” Gaddafi calls, “I only keep a lactating camel and a tent And a lot of female guards, too” The west applauds a lack of ambition The press jostle for the best lines Our finest prodigal son comes home They bring him out from the desert cold And rewards him with his Pan Am bomber He graces more covers with his girls “See, my people love me,” he says, “That’s why they only speak my mind And make sure I am a happy man” Now there are bombers in his skies How dare the Libyans speak their mind And cost the good man a peaceful sleep? © 2011, Jude Ifeme Subscribe to POETICALLY SPOKEN by Email

It’s been one year since the chaos and bloodbath in 12th Mile, but the relics of the violence and destruction still littered the streets; burnt-out cars down the alleys, a few houses razed to the ground in attempts to smoke-out their occupants, skeletons of motorbikes posing here and there – the human remains were buried in a hurry, their eternal homes unmarked. First, it was jealousy, but the town was now blighted with a more dangerous malaise – greed. Like all easy-comes, the looted clothes have faded, the shoes worn-out and a common enemy gone. Those who haven’t squandered their loot were stuck with it half-swallowed. “Get away from here!” Money ordered a herd of louts, simply called ‘the boys’, who have come to the shop to demand for money. With his hand frantically groping the counter, the boys reluctantly ambled across the street. “The shop is for us all.” One of the boys uttered stubbornly. “Who said that?” Money demanded, his loud voice bulging the roof. A teenage boy...

They pretend to lead us – Self-sent messiahs, con geniuses Milking the cow, starving the calves, Blowing up the people For the love of the people? "Arise O’ compatriots..." A call to obey if you are still in Erstwhile dreams! O’ mother Nigeria, raped by her own! They pretend to lead us – A barrel of laughs for the rich and famous The poor look to Mohamed and Jesus Praying, struggling Praying… To tell a glance from a scowl A dance from a prowl Subscribe to POETICALLY SPOKEN by Email

If you can’t see it, it is spiritual. If you can’t explain it, it is illogical. If it’s too good to be true, it is magical. If you are slashed as you read it, it is surgical. And if you have d-dancing feet, it is musical. But this poem only dances to the drum of the heart, Whispers no rhyme and waits on no reason. This poem washes in rivers of redemption, Teaches lost souls how to walk on water. This poem preaches not hell or heaven Yet reaches those with blunt inclinations. A blade and a needle if your soul is missing, This poem is a stitch for what was and will be. A launder for pure minds turned public convenience, This poem casts aversion amongst rogues and saints. A call for the soul to return to its shell, This poem is illogicalspiritualmagicalsurgicalmusical, If that is universal. 2011© Jude Ifeme Subscribe to POETICALLY SPOKEN by Email

It is 02:20 in the morning; I have just woken to the sounds of crickets in an eerie atmosphere. Beyond the light from my apartment, is darkness – total darkness, it leaves you with a feeling that you are being watched, or lurked around. FEAR – you see, it is not these things I could see in my room, I mean these I am familiar with, that give me the chill, but the ones beyond my walls. Those ones that lie only in my imagination, those I cannot touch, those I do not know. In life what scares us the most are not those things that are in the known. Our biggest fears often work into our psyche and become the greatest hindrance of a lifetime – our choices, our hopes, our joy marred by things that more often than not will never come to pass. The biggest burdens most of us carry in life are not our troubles, or the real challenges of life, but the boulder of fear we laden our shoulders with. They turn trouble into nightmare and challenges into dilemma. We are imaginative beings, always ...