Monday, October 31, 2016

Last of an Endangered Breed

Courtesy: @refugees

Prospects turn up worse than a gamble
The gruesome vocabulary
Will fill up a board of Scrabble
I can't make out my itinerary
Thro the road all runners come.
No avenue of escape from this soul Armageddon
So l cling to the brink of deliberate disaster
Gives me pause. My dirge is mastered.
I sense my exit right on course
Last of an endangered breed
I'm beleaguered by the creed
Of a nobler class.
Like I'm staring thro a frosted glass
My immediate proximity
Is nightmares to humanity.
How do I breathe?

Akpan



Game of Dice

Courtesy: Twitter/UNHCR

There's a lot of irony in life
And it don't come without a slice
Of the usual freak show
Well if I survive long enough to grow old
I'd rename myself the miracle.
Now the possibility don't seem so practical
But heck nothing else is.
Besides this man-made Apocalypse
We hear so many suggestions
But situation's raising so many more questions.
Legislation's matching 'em all with objections
Hypocrisy is their obsession.
So what, we dying?
In their greed-shot eyes
We ain't even trying.
It's like a game of dice.

Akpan



Prejudice

Courtesy: Twitter

My life ain't heaven
Hell! Even the path I tread is uneven
So many tears shed
Yet tears forgotten
Keep agitating my cryptic bed
Still I don't wanna be forgotten.
My tragedy
Exists because I was born before my time
But there are certain things for which I owe no apology
And this will do just fine.
The greatest pain discovered
Is that men judge a book by the cover,
What's the bother taking a peek?
Just a glimpse, men that's just deep
Enough to make their prejudiced judgement
Based on their fraternized mental dysfunctionment.


Akpan



Wednesday, October 26, 2016

It All Goes On

Courtesy: Twitter

It all goes on.
Life down here is a two-way portal.
It all goes on.
You get in you get out aint no rebuttal.
It all goes on.
You’re born you grow up you buy yo’ ticket.
It all goes on.
Life’s a bitch so get real and quit faking it.
It all goes on.
Folks live folks love folks die deal with it.
It all goes on.
If babies die in time of war who gives a flying frosting?
It all goes on.
Pregnant women? Children? Erase the wasted.
It all goes on.
So what if the survivors grow up uneducated?
It all goes on.
We dream, we laugh, and we kill, all in one breath.
It all goes on.
It’s the life we chose; it’s the life we run to death.
It all goes on.
You are all blood of my blood, flesh of my flesh.
It all goes on.
And if we want we can turn the sun before it sets.
Life does go on.

Akpan



Monday, October 24, 2016

Dead Dreams

Courtesy: Twitter

Staring down over a grave of dreams
I observe a billion good intentions go to rut
Solitary reapers on the verge of picking the gleanings
But falling just shy of their mature expectations.
Never made it but almost
Dreams coming thro but not quite fulfilled,
Lives well lived… almost.
Destinies moderately decoded.
I wonder how many millions have trucked this way;
What each heart would pour out and lay bare
If they were offered another shot to set things straight.
Would they make akin mistakes or throw in their best?
Because in the tomb where dreams are laid to rest
Only uncorrupted half-assed undertakings
Narrate tales of aborted victories,
And paint pictures of triumph’s grave defeats.

Akpan



Sunday, October 23, 2016

Houdini Girl

 
When Yusra Houdini (I mean Mardini) fled from Syria to Europe, her boat’s engine died and it began to take on water, Yusra pushed the boat towards Greece for 3.5 hours. She swam for her life and lived to swim for the first Refugee Olympic Team (ROT) at the Rio Olympics.

They all could have gone to heaven in a lil’ rowboat
Fetching the blind denouement to lives built on tragedies.
They thought it was the end of a beautiful anecdote
But your charm and grace brought a twist to the story,
Plotting a route thro troubled waters like a sea creature
You were the courage-fueled motor that found a landfall,
A personality having in herself facility to produce light.
Hardiness of your heart has percolated into souls to ignite
And crystallize minds that otherwise was habitat to despair.
You are the dream and the hope of 21 million battle-scarred.

Akpan



Tuesday, October 18, 2016

Everything Lost

Courtesy: UNHCR

Nothing to hide
Because they lost everything;
The unhinging look in their eyes
Speaks volumes on life that’s empty,
Fleeing home they found an excuse
For a bettered sense of purpose
They threw their all down and fused
And then watch their lives decompose.

Live and let die
They’ve seen the end of everything,
Stuck in a rut it sure is tough to ride
Who gets school? Who reaps nothing?
The specter of inequality threw sucker
Punches and blew it right out the water;
You don’t get what you deserve life sucks
How do you start over when you lost it all?

Akpan



Friday, October 14, 2016

Not Happy 2 Fake It

Anjelina Lohalith
Courtesy: @Refugees

This is the seventh in a poetry series created from lyrics of musical classics.
The piece you are about to read begins with the seventh line of the song “Easy” by Lionel Richie.

I’m not happy when I try to fake it
In fact I’m sad when I try to fake it
What’s the point if I’ll just break it
Best of time’s when I have to take it
On my own terms is how I’ll make it
I’m doing fine and you can’t shake it
I’m off the charts n’ you can’t rate it
So please let me be or I will regret it
Eat my cake n have it cause I bake it
Opposition crumbles cause I flake it
Unleash the dragon but don’t wake it
I’m not happy when I try to fake it

Akpan



Who They Want

Courtesy: UNHCR/Dominic Nahr

This is the seventh in a poetry series created from lyrics of musical classics.
The piece you are about to read begins with the seventh line of the song “Easy” by Lionel Richie.

Everybody wants me to be who they want me to be.
But I’m just swingin’ and making merry being myself.
They talk such trash around me it’s hard to imagine
Not feeling put away like a bird stuck in its cage cell
But I defined myself for myself no doubt cause I am
This close to decoding an overdrive translation of me,
They spit every answer in the form of a questionnaire
It’s complicated to escape but ama stand and stay free,
And stay true to the original plan it’s the only way I see
Myself crossing that river leaving behind this negativity,
Until I pull all the plugs I’ll never really dig the reason
Everybody wants me to be who they want me to be.

Akpan



Paid

Rose Lokonyen
Courtesy: @Refugees

This is the sixth in a poetry series created from lyrics of musical classics.
The piece you are about to read begins with the sixth line of the song “Easy” by Lionel Richie.

I paid my dues to make it
Thing is situation is yet to get with it
And there’s no way of going around it.
Can’t believe I’m doing this over again
It’s the craziest place for me to exhale.
Impossible to think I went thro all that
Only to have to bring nightmares back,
I’m incarcerated in a distorted déjà vu
I could wish the world was mine to rule,
But where is the fun if I am a deadbeat?
A different stroke of fate what do I do?
I paid my dues to make it.

Akpan



Thursday, October 13, 2016

Chains on Me

Courtesy: Twitter

This is the fifth in a poetry series created from lyrics of musical classics.
The piece you are about to read begins with the fifth line of the song

 “Easy” by Lionel Richie.

Why in the world, would anybody put chains on me?
I’m not cut to the size of your fancy or built to please
I’m not molded by the consent of popular opinion,
I’m a superordinary me living in a superordinary union
With the myself in constant control of my next move.
I want to taste sweet freedom and wholesome creativity
Climb up to the next level sure I have nothing to prove
To anyone, it’s just me doing my thing captain of my ship.
I love to see my life as a city with a moat set about its walls
A fortress guarded by resolve and ramparts of resolution.
Let me be and soon you will see what this man can achieve
Why in the world, would anybody put chains on me?

Akpan


By the Lapels


Popole Misenga
Courtesy: @Refugees
This is the fourth in a poetry series created from lyrics of musical classics.
The piece you are about to read begins with the fourth line of the song
 “Easy” by Lionel Richie.

You see, I begged, stole and I borrowed
I got my priorities and focus zeroed ‘n.
Perched on the lip of a 10,000 foot drop
Every muscle and hair in my follicle’s worked up
I’m worked out but I’m still taking this fight to the limits.
Aint asking many questions just backed up by one reason;
I’m still breathing fire from residuum of cold clinkers.
If I lost everything, I gave it up to pull things back together.
Water breaks on my brow, salt hits my eyes produces tears
But you won’t see me coming cause I’m mo than these years.
Measure of my fears don’t amount to the aim of my goal
You see, I begged, stole and I borrowed.

Akpan



All I Can

Courtesy: UNHCR/Frederic Noy

This is the third in a series of poetry created from lyrics of musical classics.
The piece you are about to read begins with the third line of the song 
“Easy” by Lionel Richie.


Seems to me girl, you know I done all I can
I battled lions, raised my game to change the program.
Now my life is rearranged I aint drawing you a diagram
Things won’t stay the same so blame the pain.
I’m breaking loose from traits that got my brain in a cage
It’s not that easy but I’m trading my ache for gain.
It’s this life I chose to live; it’s the calling I gatto give,
Sticking around’s like battling a legion I gatto breathe-
Freedom baby, is of the essence and I’m gon’ get it anyway
I can, I can’t give up that spells suicide and I don’t play.
It’s my only way of taking the last stand
Seems to me girl, you know I done all I can.

Akpan



Leaving You

Courtesy: UNHCR/Achilleas Zavallis

This is the second in a series of poetry created from lyrics of musical classics.
The piece you are about to read begins with the second line of the song
“Easy” by Lionel Richie.

Girl, I’m leaving you tomorrow.
Give your best kiss to mama tell her I said so
It’s cold out there on the routes I’ll plow
But I aint much good to you if I hung around
Think of me as your own human anchor;
That person you let go when you need him most.
I may never find my way back home again
I don’t even have a roadmap for the journey I make,
I make no promises I only hope you’ll understand
Someday when you ripen into a full-blown woman
I’m sorry baby but there’s something you must know;
Girl, I’m leaving you tomorrow.

Akpan



Can't Stand the Pain

Courtesy: UNHCR/Andre McConnell
This is the first of a series of poetry created from lyrics of musical classics.
The piece you are about to read begins with the first line of the song “Easy”
by Lionel Richie. In the next six or seven poems I’m going to pick subsequent
lines of that great song to jump-start each new piece.


I know it sounds funny but I just can’t stand the pain.
The sun’s pitched at 12 o’ clock but the storm won’t abate
It’s rage all over; I’m several miles into this insanity
When all hell spills over who’s gon’ set my soul free?
I was halfway there before they blew the final whistle
Not that I was late in coming; my effort wasn’t useful.
I crossed the river so many times I lost count already.
How much longer before my dreams hit the cemetery?
I wonder what it takes to last in this fading existence,
If anything besides pain can lay claim to consistence
If there’s no point of reference, aint no reason to aim.
I know it sounds funny but I just can’t stand the pain.

Akpan


Saturday, October 1, 2016

Tomorrow

It's my country's 56th Indy Celebration.
I can see tomorrow more clearly than I see today.

Tomorrow;
I can’t not wait for it to come up
I reach out to the fullness of my cause and take hold
And erase the present like chalk writing in a storm.
Tomorrow
I perfect my kingdom come
I set my sights on unebbing tides bearing better things
Calling out to promises dressed up in work-clothing.
Tomorrow
I’m a changed man with a changed plan in a changed land
Counting my trophies right before the final whistle blows
Totally unflustered by the ashes of today’s smolder.
My tomorrow
Far outweighs anything that defines my today,
I don’t have to believe it it’s what I know,
For the labors of heroes past shall never be in vain.

Akpan




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