Someone Help
What shall I say
When my mouth is treason
Where can I go
When my home is a prison
Where shall I stay
When the drums not be enchanted
How can I dream
When chilly winter is my season
How shall I walk
When my land is forsaken
How could I dance
When my feet are but broken
What shall I talk
When my tongue has nev’r spoken
How can I speak
When my soul within is shaken
Short and Proud
You are a short person
Just admit, for it is true
And there are many reasons
Why being short have benefits
The short and the taller
Are all gifts from God
To make one as the other
And deny one as another
There is no notable gain
Why short peoples are not tall
Except that taller people
May stand out in the crowd
Waste no night sleep
Oh short and carping man
For fast olden the tall’s wit
And slowly go their might.
Summer Dammar
The shoes that I am wearing
Have steel toes
And the glass through which I gaze
Is tinted within
I count hours, like accounting for pecks
And the tick of the watch
Stands suspended, like a kite
As if life has given up tryin’
The clothes that I am wearing
Have steel imbedded inside
And the map through which I peep
Will lead me straight home
Sounds
Faces, cold, sullen and morbid
Blood, bold, sour, and sordid
Memory plays on your views
And hear sounds without news.
Hear the rhythm the drums fuse
Tear down the mask they use
Ululate and whistle in Bemba
And set aflame a blinking ember.
Oh, the music of striking laughter
Composition of a native drifter
The shadows eastward tire
To set shaking waists on fire
The land comes awake every night
Daughters line to see sons fight
There is a party within a feast
And winners are crowned by a fist
Diapers
These diapers long gazed upon
As they whimper through time
On mere papers of rare cushion
And the dream of healthy babies
Though the diapers be wet
Through the blinking mirrors
Their smell breed memories
And in them we keep stories.
Your name is like sticking gum
Your speech is a blubbing charm
Your limbs nimble and tender
And in our hands rests your heart.
This summer we tread the mall
Wearing only flaps and little Os
And changing many diapers
With love dots on joyful wipers
Oh, My God
Oh, my God, wow!
What wows is an owl
An owl lives in the trees
The trees grow in a forest
The forest in which birds hide
Hiding from slings and stones
Stones of lime and marbles
Marbles which built the city
The city is
A province is in
Country is a kind of music
Music may be hip-hop
Hip-hop is an art
Art is made by brush and paint
Paint is of many colours
Colours may be in orange
Fruit may be sour or sweet
Sweet is like sugar
Sugar is from sugarcane
Sugarcane is grown in
World Cup is in
A continent has nations
Nations may be
People have different names
Names like John or Mwewa
Mwewa is a Bemba
Bemba is a tribe
A tribe consists of nationals
Nationals have races
Races may be white or black
Black absorbs light
Light comes from the sun
The sun is in the sky
The sky is in heaven
Heaven is, oh my God,
God’s holy throne!
Newspapers
North of newly built station and
East of the empty plot of land is
West of the well-known bank, and
South of the coliseum’s magic block
People read news everyday
And there is no day without it
Papers are spread out in layers
Early each morning just before
Roads become filled with people
Selling and buying newspapers.