Mandela: Couldn't Heaven Wait?

Merry Christmas, Madiba!

One more Christmas and it may have been right.

Then they could have you and paste you like the stars to the sky.

I know there’s always a first time

So why didn’t heaven single out this moment;

Pick a perdurable person to perform a positive pilot project?

It would have felt right

And we wouldn’t whine

Yeah, it may not have hurt as much to cry.

For once, couldn’t heaven wait?

And couldn’t Christmas floor the pedal and get here ASAP?

How do we trade healing for this hurting?

Silence been pregnant since the exit of Mandela.

They couldn’t slam the door on December, that’s alright.

But couldn’t heaven for once, just hold the damn line?

Akpan

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Catching Up On Christmas

A man (or woman) had a booze overdose on Christmas eve and woke up midnight of 25th or on Boxing Day to find out what we found out already; Christmas day is over and done. But wait, it's Boxing Day so he can still salvage his situation. He picks a fast food joint and goes out to celebrate Christmas.

What if the maitre d' is an old pal who's had a not-so-good experience with our guy? Of course, they recognize each other almost immediately the maitre d' comes to take his order. What if Boxing Day becomes... well, boxing day (like the Mike Tyson kind of boxing)?

Photo: yogadragonden.blogspot.com

          Boozed on the eve, slept thro Christmas and awoke on Boxing Day
          Feeling like I dug out a tunnel thro Kilimanjaro.
          Wished myself a Merry Christmas and got off to celebrate.
          I figured I could still catch up on the fun shake up old bones.
          I went out and caught a bus and rode 5 miles to port unknown,
          Walked in a diner, picked a table with a view of the sea.
          The menu was in french, curved like seashells and plated with chrome.
          I leafed thro the tome whistling happy tunes and reminiscing
          Of the good times I've had and the one I lost and ones to come.
          The diner was called The River; the Calabar dish got me gone.
          
          The maitre d' crossed the hardwood floor and spoke. Barely caught his drift.
          I tore my eyes off my meal, paid him attention and fell plumb.
          Earth stood still at that moment and its only sound was bereft. 
          I could see we met before, his hard stare was cold and oblong.
          "So, we meet again." He didn't have to say it. I felt it
          Like I felt what came next; this guy was an inch shy of 7 feet.
          He waited tables at a diner till I got his butt fired.
          The River's air morphed into a living thing, sentient and dire.
          The maitre d' bared his knuckles. "Don't do something you gon' regret,"
          I said, getting up to my 7'2". "I don't welsh on a bet."
          
          
          
          Akpan

Card #1: Variety ft. Nat King Cole

Nat King Cole

Although it's been said many times

Many ways, Merry Christmas to you

                             Nat King Cole,

                             The Christmas Song

If there was another way of saying Merry Christmas,

What would it be?

What feel would the phrase kick up?

A million and one times

I have pushed for something appropriate;

A word, a phrase.

Trying for variety, if you please.

If that strikes you as nuts, I won’t argue.

But I only want to shoot my message with creative force,

Mail it in over the transom.

I’m heavy with inspiration

Which don’t seem well acquainted with dialect.

Words make me inept.

I’m like storm cloud that’s forgotten how to turn its tummy.

Isn’t there someone who feels likewise?

Someone who knows the words or gestures that’s just right?

And while I’ll Google and Google, and for variety Google one more time,

Here’s a blast from the past that’s a golden gas:

Merry Christmas.

Eneh