A PRAYER
Help me in my sacrifice
Help me oh God
This year they will circumcise
each other again
They will come here
Complaining about witchcraft
God the Father, God the son
And my ancestors help me
This ritual is my gain
When that man goes home healed
That is the basis
of my eating.
A WORKING NATION
A Working Nation is led by
a walking duck
A working nation is galvanized
by snarling motorcade
Don’t sit there and look
for pombe
While others are working on
the farm
A working nation on government
vision
It is steered by an interventionist
president
Rallying a coalition and national
unity
Do not sit there with your
hands down
While others are breaking the
sense of nationalism
A working nation manages its
internal affairs
In a working nation people
look for jobs
We have friends and well- wishers
in this country
Don’t sit there with
folded arms
Come forward and join the culture
of hard work.
THE BEST POEM I READ
Glad, sad and mad
I mediate the good and painful
things in my life
Powerful feelings flow
I write about feelings
Honest and best feelings
Honest writing, ringing with
feelings from my heart
Intense, uncensored, highly
changed thought
Honest writer is the best writer
Writing about feelings
Most direct and straight forward
Coming from the spirit
Coming from inspiration
Flowing without direction
Flowing without control
Impulse without end
Classical music and poetry
in the background
Brood about the good and painful
things of life
The best poem came from re-reading
Neruda
Reading Derek Walcott and John Donne
Filanga happy with my love
and with life
My mind was filled
I drifted and day dreamed
Falling in a systematic derangement
of the senses
Arthur Rimbaudi’s conscious
day mind
And the self same subconscious
dream mind
I fall into a trance with my
words
The dream mind leads the day
mind
The dream world leads me to
the world of instinct
But am I awake or am I dreaming?
Strong emotions dictate my
thoughts
Strong emotions grip me and
I write
I write the best poem
Charged with my unique spirit
Style, subject, form and intellect
come later
I follow my instincts
And I write a natural poem
Redolent with genuine feelings.
I sequester myself from the
poem
By cutting its umbilical cord
by the navel
I am now a reader and not a
writer
I have brought you to life
I leave my thought
And invite the words to rule
over me
Tell me, what do they mean?
I am a true poet
I love my art for art’s
sake
For its beauty
For the pleasure it gives me
I make a scan line and I pause
I take a breath from feelings
Allen Ginsberg’s natural
breath-line
The best poem follows the beat
generation
Kerouac and Ginsberg
JUMA, THE UGLY VILLAGER
In Chesamisi once
I saw Juma by the village butchery
Breaking the wind
Carrying his swollen ugly feet
Flies following dry leftovers
from his anus
Glued on the gaping wounds
of his naked back
He wore Kamatasi, the tatters
of shirts
Shredded coats and vests woven
together by sticks
He carried an earth-brown satchel
Loaded with rages from frayed
blankets
Flies lice and bedbugs stood
at the edge of his apparel
Singing by his ears
Crawling on his wounded hands
On the white and black mucus
of his nose
His hair stood on his large
Karl Marx head
Like stilted sticks
Dirt sticking at its ends like
dark pelts
Darkened by the burning of
yesterdays
Juma the ugly villager had
no history
Came from the world war
Castrated by bullets at the
frontline
An eunuch whining like a mule
Belching the diseases of Burma
He walked up the hill when
he leaned of his dead parents
He returned after several seasons
strayed
Only went up to collect the
firewood
And warmed himself
In the abandoned hut
Juma’s large forehead
Juma’s jaws
Hanging on his brow like rocks
Were brightened with yellow
teeth
And the bleeding gum
Caused by chewing of sugar
cane
And cracking bones from the
butchery
No word came from his labia
majora for lips
As he rummaged the rocks for
fruit
And threw some in anger and
jest at passers-by
Juma, the ugly man of Chesamisi
The robust tourist attraction
To children and the indolent.
