Mo' Than You'll Ever Know

For Refugee Olympic Team participating at
The Tokyo 2020 Olympic games.
Photo Courtesy: UNHCR

Mo' than you'll ever know

I'm rooting for you

Bring back the gold

And paint the skies blue

I hope your dreams come true

You deserve that gold

More than Simone Biles

Twisting her neck-wringing style

So I'm rooting for you

Cause refugees can too

Shout out to Mosamah cycling

Her way all thru to the olympics

I'm cheering for amazing athletes

Like Kimia, Dina and Abdullah

Mo' than Sha' Carri Richardson

When she pumping like a train coming

Down the track

I'm rooting for Anas Al Khalifa

For Cyrille, the weightlifter.

That's why I'm making it plain

Like a shot of pain

To the back of the brain

Rain down on Tokyo

Like Nyiragongo Volcano.

I'm rooting for you

Mo' than you'll ever know

I'm sold out to you

And that's all you need to know.

Akpan

Refugees Make The world Go Round

Today's World Refugee Day
Image Courtesy: UNHCR

Refugees make the world go round

Same world tried to run 'em aground,

So we celebrate World Refugee Day

Cause everyday is a murder day

Not cause everyday's a holiday,

Ethnic cleansing is kids at play

And cruel wars have come to stay,

But we'd celebrate for no reason

And joy would be vague n' a treason,

If we wasn't celebrating people

Fleeing home

Where violence became a staple,

People who reached out to hope

When hope dug a hole

In their soul

And shooed 'em out in the cold.

And now they're raising a torch

In the thick of our darkness,

To guide the world

With the light of their brightness

Cause only together with refugees

Can we really heal

The horror that slithers in the still

Of the night when dreams are starlit,

Only together can we learn

To mend the broken cistern

And combine a beam of 10,000 lights

To ignite each other to shine

In a world where refugees

Compete in the Olympics

Like the swimmer called Yusra,

Are helping to fight the pandemic,

Fighting for youth rights like Aya,

And Ramatulahi who's a lawyer,

Making aviation history like Ghazal

And there's a lady who's a doll maker,

The Olympian who's a mental health worker,

And of course, the professional footballer.

Refugees are writing their names in gold

On the cosmic walls of this globe.

Akpan

Refugees Are People

The official 29 members of
The IOC Refugee Olympic Team
participating in the Tokyo 2020 Olympics
Courtesy: The UNHCR YouTube channel

Refugees are people.

Feed that to your mental input device,

Refugees are people,

Not some three blind mice

Kids poke to see how they run,

Real people scorched by fires of war

Whose hearts assumed a charred tone.

Just so you know,

Refugees are no invertebrate-

Queered mammals with no backbones,

Let that thought percolate

And there'll be no bones

About acknowledging a humanity

Beamed by a deep and inventive personality,

Although, we're called 'refugees,'

We're a people pumping redemptive energies

We strive to extort our past

By making sacrifices that last.

We're going the whole nine yards

And this ain't no thin gruel,

We're pleased to present a world class

World record breaking crew,

Drumrolls please...

The IOC Refugee Olympic Team.

That's proof there's more to “Refugee"

Than the downtalk that meets your ear,

“This is going down in history,

And our names will be there.”

Akpan

DRC Need You

Displaced Congolese kids having a meal at a UNHCR Refugee Camp

Please Assist

Like Breonna was sleeping

When the cops came creeping,

So it came to pass in the DRC,

All was silent and still

When Nyiragongo crept on the scene,

Wasting lives, slaying animals,

Razing farms, spewing lava

Sending people fleeing over

The border into Rwanda.

When a volcano erupts,

Men pay a deadly cost

And it's only human

To lend a helping hand

To show a little kindness

To a thousand displaced Congolese

Journeying back from Rwanda

And cushion the thunder

Putting the people under

And their hearts will be stronger

And their days grow longer

And all their memories fonder.

Share the wonders of love,

Knead your attitude

Hello, world

The DRC needs you.

Akpan

I Still Have Dreams

Eldric Sella
Competing in Boxing at the Tokyo Olympics
as a member of the IOC Refugee Olympic Team.
Photo Courtesy: unhcr.org

I still have dreams

Though my sorrow never sleeps

Still contending with the streams

Of tears and silent screams,

I still have dreams

Making miracles on bended knees

Decoding unsearchable mysteries

I still have dreams

Like the blue seas got shrimps

I still have dreams

I believe destiny's coming thru

I spy tomorrow n' it's all good,

I still have dreams

Even tho my past is grim,

And I'll keep on dreaming

Long after this madness done streaming,

I still have dreams.

I still have dreams

That what tomorrow brings

Is gon' up my blessings

My face is set like flint,

After dreams cease

And the universe peels

Apart at the seams,

I'll still have dreams.

Dreams of touching the sky,

Dreams of wrapping my fingers

Around the bulge of the prize,

Dreams of a uniquely better

Brighter, boosted kinda life

Dreams of being accepted as human,

Dreams to manifest the man I am

And having done all to stand

I still have dreams

That my dreams will birth realities

I still have dreams

That all of my tomorrows

Will nuke the weight of my sorrows

I still have dreams

I still have dreams

That these dreams will bloom

Right through the womb

And raise me up from the tomb

And enact Lazarus Impressions

Like a cup of fresh lime to thirst

These dreams I have

Will the Red Sea halve

Like a raised staff

Parting water to make dry land.

I still have dreams

That the world will see in me

A jewel of humanity,

Sowing seeds of creativity

To fashion scenes for posterity.

I still have dreams

Of churning my darkness to release

Me into a thousand beams

Of light that keep on shining

And shining and shining… 

I still have dreams

In the midst of these miseries

Surrounding me like the seven seas.

Akpan

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

Related articles

• The Refugee Olympic Team Now Has Its Own Flag and Anthem
• UNHCR #WithRefugees petition heads to UN Secretary-General
• Refugee team adds luster to the Olympic ideal
• Olympian Swam Three Hours To Save 20 Refugees While Fleeing Syria
• The Refugee Nation Creates Flag for Refugee Olympic Team
• All-new refugee team wins hearts, if not medals, at Rio Olympics

One

Courtesy: UNHCR Kenya

To the memory of the 22 aid workers killed and 100 people injured that day when the UN Headquarters in Baghdad was bombed. And all those who continue to dedicate themselves to helping others.

I never thought the word one could amount to much.

Like what can one man do in this crazy world, after all?

That was all before I looked in a mirror and set my eyes on you;

And I knew one could sometimes translate as beautiful.

I never knew the word one could create such earthy symphony:

Like one people, one song, one dance, one humanity,

One hope, one faith in one love in sync with one heartbeat

Sweeps the mind off its feet yet it’s the definition of you and me.

Akpan