POEM #1292: What Papa Gave Me

First of July, 1995, Dad went home to be with the Lord. It's been a tough ride down life's track for me but the lessons he taught me got me counting blessings and thanking God every single day, for giving me a good father. Because Dad was a good father. 
Sir (that's what I called my father), this one's for you.

What Papa gave me
Was faith in my personal skills
A consuming appeal for creativity
And an undying zeal for intellectuality
What Papa gave me was
A fistful of valor
Passed down from a Man of Honor
A spirit that never says die
Papa was the dot on my ‘i’
The inspiration for my flight
What Papa gave me was
A heart after God's heart
A soul that bleeds for the world
He was a man of many parts
What Papa gave me was 
A fiery courage to take up
The baton and continue the glorious
Race that he'd begun
What Papa gave me was
A fervent hope that perseveres
And withstands the bitter years
What a glory it sheds on my way
To this very day
What Papa gave me was
Greater than gold and diamond
It's the greatest love of all
What Papa gave me was
God
In live and living color.

Akpan

Poem #1291: Juneteenth 2022: Celebrating Freedom

Africa 

Your sons and daughters

Triumph in a faraway land

Freed from all fetters

Travails of our grandmothers

And grandfathers have

Unlocked the prison doors

And made room for the walk to freedom

When God turned again the captivity

Of the children of Africa

We were like they that dream dreams

From our fathers

And carry the glories

From our mothers

Ours is a story scribbled in blood

Stolen from fields of gruesome massacre

Of a people robbed of choice

But free at last

We their chillun

Celebrate the victory of the past

With a resounding blast

Hallelujah we're free at last

No more slaves

But joint heirs of the land

In which our fathers were apes

And our mothers raped

Our freedom is blood bought

And free we shall remain

Whatever the cost.

Akpan 

Poem #1289: She Smiles To Conquer

Dr. Coretta Scott King
Civil rights Activist, Founder, The
Martin Luther King Center and wife of
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. This poem celebrates
her life and legacy. She would have been 95 today.

Girl, if that smile

Ain't bright shinin'

Up in heaven now

Sho' you laid down

Your burdens

Ran up the streets of heaven

Got down to the river

Set down on a recliner

And laid back

Sipping on new wine

Under the Tree of Life

Cause God 

Done tossed the sun

And put your smile up

Girl, if that smile

Don't shine on

A thousand miles

With the joy of the Lord.

You took your smile away

And life's been insane

But you passed the torch

And sparked a marathon

For love and BeLove

Happy Heavenly Birthday

We'll remember you alway

For making a better day…

And for that smile

Lordy Lord, that smile. 

Akpan

Poem #1288: Hand From A Stranger

Please donate. Click the link: World Food Program

This ain't no fairytale

But it does make

The dam break

It's the stuff you see

On CNN and BBC

And flip the channel

Before it gets too personal

We can't back down

From this urgency of now

We've got to man up,

We that love to love

Must mobilize as one

Against the elements of war

By wielding the weapon

Of compassion

From our heart of hearts

Until we tear apart

The memory of the past

A bit of love turns misery

Into the processing

Of a beautiful story

Like a warm hand

From a stranger

In the dark of night,

Be the shining light

In their turnaround moment

A shade of hope, a respite

From the cruel torment.

Akpan 

Poem #1287: A Different Cloth

Photo Courtesy: UNHCR 

The most important thing

Is not to give in

To defeat

Or fall in the arms of

Hopeless dejection.

Destiny isn't a handout

And you can choose not

To feel letdown

You made it out

You were cut out

For greatness no doubt

Rejection is a lie

Boost that bark with a bite

There's a job title

With your name on it

No time to stay idle

Set your mind on it

This is a diff level of warfare

Not a personal affair

You've been cut

From a different cloth

Keep your head up

And never ever give up.

Akpan

Poem #1286: Déjà Vu Encores

Thru the worst level of conflict, Kyiv is still standing.
Their resilience is triumph of the human spirit.
Photo Courtesy: Euronews.com/Facebook 

Every night

I wanna pick up the phone

And be like

Call you up at home

But now it's always night

Where you once called home

A constant starless midnight

Haunts its skies

Going on and on and on

Like a Déjà Vu encore

I wish to hold your hands

And close the distance

To hold your hurt

Till it hurts to hold

Anymore

And still to hold

Until we share true warmth

Sometimes, I hear your voice

Louder than a train's horns

And when the bombings cease

And the smoke's gone

With the wind

Kyiv is still standing

These words sing

The sweetest music

Hope is a living thing:

Kyiv is still standing.

Akpan

POEM #1285: Nails

Courtesy: Facebook

Don't even think

For a fraction of a minute

He didn't feel the pain

Of the cruel Roman nails

That bore into His flesh

Like unwelcome guests

And pinned his arms and feet

To the hastily carved tree

That hugged Him

Until His final heartbeat

Don't think for a second

When He cried out to God

His despair was an act

He was only playing His part

See the cruelty of the nails

As the debt He paid

To ransom us from disgrace

And save us by His grace

For as the nails were real,

Even as the pain was real,

Even so the guarantee

Of our redemption is real.

Akpan 

Poem #1284: Elisha's Bones

In honor of Dr. Martin Luther King on the
 54th anniversary of his assassination.

Struck down
But not destroyed
He wears the crown
And still raises from the dust
Those cast to the ground
Like Elisha's bones
His words
Produce hormones
That makes a corpse
Rise again
Makes broken hearts
Beat again
Over n' over
Flowing down like a river
To bountifully water
A million seeds
That sprout into trees
Bearing fruit of justice
Righteousness and love
They bear the torch
He passed on
When he passed on
His words
Still spark a good fight
Like Elisha's bones
Giving brand new life.

Akpan

Poem #1283: Magartu Dedefi, Esq.

Magartu lost her sight as a toddler. At age eight,
she was forced to flee her home in Ethiopia.
She settled in Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya
where she excels her peers in academics.
She dreams of becoming a lawyer.
Photo Courtesy: UNHCR

And still we see her rise

Walking on the sunshine

Her face lit up in a halo

That forecasts tomorrow

In live and living color

From war

To take the world

She blind

But she ain't no beggar

She looks just fine

And all set to be a lawyer

Her big dreams

Rattle the glass ceiling

She won't balk

In the face of competition

With her peers

Who ain't visually impaired

She lost her sight

But found the fight

For people deprived

Of their rights

As a platform to thrive

And her smile says it all

She knows she has it all

On her own terms

She wants it her way

No freebies, on equal terms

She'll rest her case.

Akpan

Poem #1282: Holodomor Legacy

Nursing Ukrainian mother victim
of Russian shelling.
Photo Courtesy: @Kateryna_Kruk (Twitter)

Starting with the Red Terror of 1918, Lenin and Stalin shared responsibility—by enforced famine, brutal imprisonment, mass killing, ethnic cleansing or assassination—for the deaths of some 20 million. (Coincidentally, Lenin and Stalin shared the same cook—the grandfather of current Russian President Vladimir Putin.) — Smithsonian

Your grandfather

Cooked for Lenin

Went further

To do for Stalin

Both Mass murderers

And Genocidal Twins

Along came Vladimir

To correct past sins

To shine the light down

And cut darkness like a shroud

Instead you and your boys

Trying to decide

Flashing lethal toys

You indulge genocide

To correct previous genocide

You know better, Putin

If you know grandpa's legacy

Remember Holodomor

And its inhumanity

Remember the perpetrator

Joseph Stalin

Creating artificial famine

Starving Ukrainians

To death

In Donetsk and Luhansk

They call it Hunger-death

Holodomor in Ukrainian

He filled that part

Of Ukraine with Russians

Now Vlad gone mad

Makes to claim

The very same

Parcel of land

In Ukraine

For Russia

Reliving your grandfather's

Evil genius Master's

Legacy ain't you

Get ready to lose

History will record you

On a list for fools.

Akpan

Poem #1281: Silence Of The Children

No change of clothes, no toys for the kids,
hiding in a room while war rages outside.
Photo Courtesy: Facebook/Newsweek

The clothes on their back

Emphasize their lack

And they can't go back

Stuck in some basement

In stack abasement

Men, women n' kids in

A den no bare necessities

In a room crowded out

War rages outside

Children hunker down

Uncertainty wracks each mind

No toys

To lighten the mood

No choice

But stay in the room

No noise

To get in the groove

Boredom

Contends with gloom

Bombs done

Increased the ruin

No fade to happy days

Wish that was the case

In a country

Where kids can't play

And run wild and free.

Akpan

Poem #1280: Crisis Rising

Seven years of war in Yemen and still no respite in sight.
Photo Courtesy: UNHCR

Seven years

Of depravity

An ocean of tears

Riven by famine

A land gone to hell

In a food basket

We forget to yell

Out casket after casket

From Yemen

Yeah men

War sprouts

Like stamen

We lost count

Of children

Starved to death

Hopelessly left

To die slow

Like a butterfly

Lured by ember glow

Distance blurs gory sights

As millions alive

Face same fate

That erased a wasted race

Love can revive

The deadest thing

And keep hope alive

If we let our hearts be

Led into an awakening

Of fiery empathy.

Akpan