From New York to Chorkor — An Optimal Time Path

I speak of nothing—especially
not of you who, tearing his
singed ear-ringed ears, sold
his heart to his hunter
who, within a cocoon
of assumed innocence,
would have been wiped dry,
but like leaves which listen not
to the dews’ news
you lost your hold
and he moulted
into a bulldozing caterpillar

I speak of what must be
of our being
…or perhaps
should have been
if not for deadly deeds our hands have done
and searing scenes our eyes have seen

In its seamless search for meaning or sign
my unkind mind did find a wine
a seller had left in the cellar to unsell
or perhaps to resell to well our cells
but which, upon further fermentation,
fortified our fractured friendship with reason
making our minds a fertile field to fruit
root and recruit mutilators for the harvests of souls

I paint a pretty picture with passion
on the path of Picasso
and they patiently collude with the elements
to suck, crack and crush the colours
off the canvass,

Kwame Nkrumah
Jomo Kenyatta
Patrice Lumumba
Steve Biko
Ken Saro-Wiwa
Nelson Mandela
Midnight light-censored life-imprisoned impressionists
Long-term time-tested surrealists

Prophets are not made
if you don’t believe it ask your God
or your great great great grandmother

To escape his wickedness
they walked through
mad halls and mud walls
Sani Abacha
Mobutu Sesseko
Idi Amin
Foday Sanko
Charles Taylor
Jonas Savimbe
The cart is before the horse now
and the pushers are before the cart
with their fore-feet firmly fixed in concrete
…pushing and ushering the passengers
shamelessly
into the enchanting chambers of charms and chains
into the enchanting chambers of chains and pains

The train is railing waywardly
toward the emergency ward
of the fern-fortified,
ramshackle clinic…

To feed these greed
To sate these insatiable palates
they took the land many a yore
from New York
…to Chorkor
without regard to the lore

03.08.2007