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By

Mbizo Chirasha

 

THE DRUM- The Zimbabwe We Want Poetry Campaign continues to knock on political leadership doors. In Africa today politicians have become little Gods who have decided to take our lives to the Canaan and Gomorrah of their making. African politics and its processes has to be redefined and realigned.

Attainment of POLITICAL positions has become a way of looting and cheating the masses as much as protecting both personal, economic and political interests. Africa is no longer the same because of greed and widespread wars. We are tired of such vices.

The Poets are saying NO to the short changing of the masses, the looting and the cheating. We remain defiant against political systems that defy the masses their right to a good life and social cohesion because of selfish interests.

A set of poems in this article are unravelling pertinent matters that continue to upset Africa and Zimbabwe included. The Poets will always continue to voice NO TO VIOLENCE, NO TO INTIMIDATION, NOT TO WATER POVERTY, NO TO DISEASES, NO TO POVERTY, NO TO LOOTING AND NO TO WARS.

Thank you more Chrispah Munyoro for the opening poem Tennis Ball and all of contributors. It is quite heartening that you want to see a truly new Zimbabwe and a changed world. Thank you again to our set of JOURNALS, Guest Poet Cde Sendoo from Mongolia. Aluta Continua Comrades, poets, followers, supporters and readers. A great Zimbabwe is in our poetry, a new Africa is in our voices and better world in is in our PEN. ASANTE SANA!- Mbizo Chirasha.

 

 

 

 

TENNIS BALL

 

 

The bizarre nexus of our era.

Epoch of paranoia ideology.

In dire poverty we are stranded.

Dejected, neglected and rejected.

From our freedom of action.

Our minds race-pacing.

Trippingly pace-racing.

Men become enemies of each other.

The weird phantasmal dribbling in Africa.

Blood wars purpling the Heath.

Deep down when stones are things of beauty.

From Mbujimai to the corridors of Rwanda

And Burundi caves.

The dances bumping from Congo like tennis balls.

Dances full of limping.

Terrorism destroying the populace.

The smoke of uncertainty and gruesome pain

Gripping Zimbabwe

 

 

 

JUDGEMENT DAY

 

 

God made the earth.

The earth was pure, fresh.

Without any hindrance or worries.

What did the men do?

Men created chaos.

Destroying and trying to be idols.

That in itself shredded this blemis.

America you decided you are an intellect.

By experimenting with science.

People kill babies under the more innocent,

Name of family planning.

Death springing from America.

Tears in Africa

Falling dismally to those who misuse the church.

Who view it as a market exchange.

Deserting the lord in jolly.

Praying to him in desperation.

Warning!! the church is not a stock exchange.

Those leaders who rule by iron rods.

Their hearts pumping subterfuge.

Who thinks he is above the law.

They can’t be asked for their actions.

Doing whatever they want like the wind.

Believe me men you are heartless.

Zombies full of fear for your steps pro tour.

In a world of action and reaction.

Wow you for the dirty money discriminating us.

Think deeply about the day of judgement.

The pieces of silver and notes.

Are useless in after life.

A man’s place is under God’s commandments.

Tip me men what will become

Of your ruthlessness?

Tell me what will happen on that day?

On the day of judgment what will you do?

I bet you shall be gnashing teeth.

Running for cover with terror.

Take heed! It shall be regretful.

But you can’t change the hands of time.

Armageddon is going to strike.

Like the speed of lightning.

On the judgement day.

 

 

(By Chrispah Munyoro – currently a student of Applied Art and Design, Graphics and Website Programming. at Kwekwe Polytechinic College in Zimbabwe. Munyoro is a talented writer, journalist and a dedicated Design Artist. She is natural linguist, fluent in many languages among them English, Shona, Esperanto, Setswana, Swahili, Italiana and Yoruba. She began as a columnist writing feature articles in the Gweru Times in Midlands Province Capital of Zimbabwe. She has worked as a Midlands Chapter Chairperson of the Zimbabwe Association of Freelance Journalists. Munyoro was once a Zimbabwe Representative at Zone IV Regional Youth Games in 2014 Bulawayo in the boxing discipline. The multi-disciplinary artist is registered under AIBA the international body of boxing. The Writer, Artist, Poet, Journalist and athlete has been writing poetry since her tender years and she has participated in various writers, poetry, journalism and sports workshops)

 

 

 

 

MY WORD

 

 

My word barbed-wire am cantankerous –

Could reality be as opposed

Judgement as out of wit –

Could finesse be as devoid.

Or the rustic-beauty

The metal-petals I weave

On iron-thorns

Be not master-piece of art.

Or you not pitiably ignorant

Rough of taste and not been

Connoisseur of fine-line.

Refinement and delicacy –

Or gentle-irony and sharp-sarcasm

Or your silence upon my truth?

Find an excuse

To avoid or simply your face turn

That you deaf and dumb

Or pretend you don’t understand.

Fear the provocatoin

Or reality-abject

To the conscience a widow open

Or your tongue pick a word.

Subversive indeed

It pulls you to think

Outside your comfort zone

It challenges you indeed –

My word.

 

 

 

INSIDIOUS PLEONEXIA

 

 

Then if you hath drunk the sea –

Your tongue dry

That ye suffer

From insidious pleonexia

That your cure

Is thy fill of blood

That ye die satiated.

 

 

(By Sadiqullah Khan – The Brave Voices Poetry Journal Solidarity Voice from Pakistan, Dr Sadiqullah Khan is a gifted poet of immense insights and creativity. Writing on a range of subjects his themes are social, spiritual and politically aware. Looking the domains of day to day living, delving deep into the sufferings and joys he seems to be the voice of dispossessed and the vast majority of poor he passionately identifies, yet his art touches the high mark of existential writing, unique in style and composition, he appears to lead his own genre. He belongs to Wana, South Waziristan in Pakistan)

 

 

 

 

DREAM TRIP

 

 

We can only live in our dreams

The paths of our dreams stretch to the Middle Ages

I take leave from humiliation, and rush to Florence

In search of Tasso’s old home. There

I long to grip Michelangelo by the hand

Or meet the fairies in Da Vinci’s paintings

Only dreams and poetry are inseparable

They are not vain or hypocritical

As they rush into the depths of my soul,

I write this line: at the centre of the earth

We can only live in our own age

We can only thank this life’s pain

 

 

(By Hadaa Sendoo – a poet and translator of international renown. He has lived in Ulaanbaatar, capital of Mongolia since 1991. He has won awards for poetry in India, the USA, Canada, Greece, China, and Russia, including the Mongolian Writers’ Union Prize. Since 1989, he has published 15 books of poetry. Sendoo’s recent collections of poems include “Sweet Smell of Grass” (in Persian 2016), “Aurora” (in Kurdish 2017), “Mongolian Long Song” (in Georgian 2017), WENN ICH STERBE, WERDE ICH TRÄUMEN (in German-Mongolian bilingual 2017)”Mongolian Blue Spots” (in Dutch,2017), and ” A Corner of the Earth”(in Norwegian 2017). Sendoo Hadaa’s influence transcends national and ethnic borders and he is recognized as a great poet of the 21th century. In 2006, he founded the ground-breaking World Poetry Almanac, which he continues to edit. Presently he also served as co-Chairman of the Council of Writers and Readers of the Assembly of Peoples of Eurasia, in Russia)

 

 

 

 

MY DREAMS

 

 

I dream of a nation, where all voices are equal.

I have a dream with authority in my voice fixing on my desires.

I dream of rainbows and tongues, determining stones houses.

I dream of watercourses from the North, tributaries from the East, and brook From the West and canals from the South establishing one great aquatic. I dream of cats and dogs assembling a quarters for their puppies and kittens I saw us making bread with cheese and chalk

In my dreams I experience voices of diverse languages singing one redemption song.

I see visions of rainbow colours sitting on each other reaching for vastness. A voice whispers in my heart “…this is the Zimbabwe I want.

 

 

 

HANDIDI NECHANZA CHANGU

 

 

Sando sando kunemunhu wese,

Handidi nechanza changu

Mvura nesipo pazvimbuzi

Ndodakushamba chanza changu

Dota neinochururuka, ndipeyi ,ndati

Ndoda kuchenesa chanza changu

Nekwaswerwa muchikokota utachiwana

Woda kuzororera korera pachanza changu

Bodo kwete handidi zvangu nechanza changu

Ndikasachiita semboni kuchengetedza

Moda kuzonditi ndoshungurudza

Ranyura haro ndopazha emutandabota

Kupera mvura muviri wose ndongonzwa nyota

Ndisisina simba ndarukutika kuita semabota

Bodo ndisiyeyi nechanza changu ndapota

 

 

(By Collen Gaga – an Activist Poet, who writes to advocate for democracy and protection of human rights though going beyond to write about other social aspect of life. He is Currently Studying for a Bachelor of Science in politics and public management at MSU Zimbabwe. His poetry career stated since childhood with reciting other people’s poetry and developed to blogging and commenting on other literature works like music and poetry. currently working on a Shona anthology of Poetry to be named Gapu ReRairo Collen is still rising the in the spheres of literature)

 

 

 

 

AFRICA DAY REFLECTIONS

 

 

The bandits came from lands far away

Came from across seas and oceans

Came armed with the maxim gun

Came armed with a warped interpretation

A warped interpretation of the bible

Came to redeem the pagan from himself

The uncivilised with their brand of civilisation

All they did was to satisfy their lust

Raped her and she still bears the scars

The mental and physical scars still there

The raw wounds there to this day

 

She still is a victim of rape today

Raped repeatedly now by kith and kin

Raped by mercenaries masquerading as liberators

Her children wail with no end in sight

Her children washed away by rivers of squalor

Her children yearning for the sun to shine again

Her children locked in combat with bandits

Those from home and from lands far away

 

 

(By Jabulani Mzinyathi– a Zimbabwean to the marrow. A firm believer in the peter tosh philosophy that there will be no peace if there is no justice. Jabulani is a pan African and a world citizen)

 

 

 

 

NEW KILLER

 

 

There is a certain irony to Einstein,

It includes his German birth

And his equation that ended the Nazis.

He might yet end the world

(But we’ll blame Oppenheimer).

Kim Jong is not the courier of death:

Just another misguided fool

Committing suicide in the name of murder.

There was the emissary of peace, Alfred Nobel

While inventing dynamite blew up his brother.

He wished weapons to be so devastating

That men will fear to pull the trigger.

If he was right then the nuclear holocaust might never happen,

If he was right so much has been taken

without reason;

And the biggest tragedy is all the nuclear waste

Seeping into underground water

Poisoning whom the bombs were meant to protect.

 

 

(By Philani Amadeus Nyoni – a Zimbabwean born wordsmith. He has written award-winning poetry for the page, the stage and the screen. He has also written articles and short stories for various publications, local and international)

 

 

 

 

MOMENT

 

 

You are awoken by poem

It’s all a bliss

As you type away

Heart dancing in its cage

Blood throbbing in the veins

Adrenaline flowing

The night cheering

Till you hit the button

The screen turns blank

And must begin again.

 

 

(By Michael Mwangi Macharia – a poet based in the Rift Valley region,kenya. He contributes literary and education articles to the kenyan dailes. He is also involved in directing,adjudicati­on of music and drama. He has developing interest in History, fine art and photography)

 

 

 

 

MY ARCHIVE

 

 

this happens to me, fifty three years

of my life at the Bancroft Library

with those famous Beat poets

me, I used to pine away in the local

café, dreaming of the Bancroft

librarians and the word they shuffle

back and forth, they were ninety

feet tall, their palms home

to fact and fiction, prose, poetry

they jumped like rabbits

on the meadow, marble eyes

rolled over the reading room floor

here I am with Mark Twain

as well, the big ponderous library

smack in the muddle of the

middle, would you offer money

for admittance? I wait for the first

of three checks, my father would be

proud, my mother breathe a sigh

of relief, I did it, they brought me over

and I signed papers, meeting both

the director and former director,

hanging out with Bonne and Steven,

I felt giddy, a bit embarrassed, hey

where is the espresso? man, I live

for the boy inside of me who is so

gray and toothless, I love for

the last gray moments that come

to every man, they have my papers,

archive, if you are at Harvard or

Stanford or Texas, I am at the Bancroft

sailing into Dreamland o’r Gutenberg’s

grim workshop of enormous proportions

 

 

(By Neeli Cherkovski – an internationally known poet living in San Francisco California. He is the author of many books of poetry and prose. His latest collection, Elegy for My Beat Generation,” it’s published by lithic press)

 

 

 

 

HOPE CLUSTERS

 

 

Hope clusters

Waiting long hours

Preaching no philosophy

No claims for supremacy

No race for superiority

No poems of pain

You bloom and fade

And make us wait

To see another bunch of blooms

 

 

(By Gopichand Paruchuri – Poet – Lecturer in English – Interest in Literature – Keen on Travelling, Head of the Department of English and Vice Principal at Guntur, Studied MA in English at Acharya Nagarjuna University)

 

 

 

 

EXILES IN EXILES

 

 

Running away from our problems,

is not even a solution at all.

No matter how long we chide, and dream to hide in exiles,

problems have no ears

but they keep an unwavering stance

no mere shout can shake.

To sneak from responsibilities,

nourishes lavishly tender sprouts of predicaments

into becoming gigantic baobabs,

much difficult to uproot!

In our absence who do we burden,

to labour on our behalf,

to effect a resolution ,a change!

whilst we risk our children’s future as we take a mad delight,

taking refuge in fleeting shadows?

Cowards we are, most exiled exiles!

Here we ought not to react contrary

but we have to embrace

only that which meet us.

Cowards we are!

For what does it return,

to assign to a mouth

a hand’s duty

and still await to see a work being accomplished?

Nothing but an impossibility!

Cowards we are, exiles in exiles.

 

 

(By Blessing T Masenga – a bold word guerrilla, a fiery poet through his writings tirelessly and boldly seek to strip nude the oppression and the violations of basic human rights)

 

 

 

 

NOT TOO LATE

 

 

Silent whispers of the heart

A deep knowing

And becoming

Deep realisation of paths to tread

Intense longing for one so dear

Silent whispers of the heart

A deep breath

Exhaling into life

Crossroads and decision points

Hoping it is not too late

To redeem old karma

Hoping it is not to late

To cut ties that bind

 

 

(By Temitope Aina –  I studied Accounting at the University of Lagos, Nigeria. I love writing poetry, reading and classical music.
I am married with three children)

 

 

 

 

RAIN

 

 

This rain

Is for grain

To sustain

Animal and man.

 

This rain

Is a painkiller

For parched throats.

Welcome boon

For the distiller.

Time’s healer.

Earth’s ruler.

 

This rain

Is a shaper of the brain.

Oil for the rusting cairn.

Maker of dew in the morning.

Song for the coxwain.

Drencher of witches.

Diesel for life’s engine.

 

 

(By Richmore Tera– a poet, short story writer, playwright, actor and freelance journalist who once worked for Zimpapers (writing for The Herald, Sunday Mail, Kwayedza, Manica Post, H-Metro) as a reporter but currently focusing on his creative work. Currently, he is the Associate Editor of Chitungiwza Central Hospital’s weelky online newsletter. His works have been read in Zimbabwe, Africa and the Dispora in various publications which he contributes to. He is the author of the monograph, “Here Leaves Silently Fall, a collection of poems, which was published by Arts Initiates in Namibia in 2009)

 

 

 

 

 

The Zimbabwe We Want Poetry Campaign