Problem Solver

I got guns

single-shot under-slug grenade launchers

sawed-off double barrel shotguns

single-action revolvers:

.357 magnums, .45 colt

Italian variants M16s

colt M 4 rifles with special mounting

system M 203 double-action trigger

anti-materiel rifle .50 BMGs

fabarm FP6 carbon fiber

9x19mm parabellums-

m 1946 sub-machine gun

double-action revolver

.30 semi-automatic carbine

.222 Remington, .243 Winchester

7mm Remington carbine

12 gauge compressed Air Launcher

general purpose machine guns

that means I can kill rats with a gun

assault rifles

civilian market variant

designated marksman rifle

.45 ACP subcompact

wlther PPKs, KAC chainSAW

brownings and Kalashnikovs

9x18 mm Makarov

aircraft mounted autocannon

plus I'm armed with C4s

then I blow fools to oblivion

that's problem solved.

Akpan

Strings of Broken Lyres

Let’s plant a forest of words

Let books take the place of trees

Let’s stage worldwide antiwar

Let justice flow like freebies

Let’s march on the walls of hate

Let’s help refugees feel safe

Let’s pull the plug and wipe this world

Let babies take the helm of control

Let armoured tanks process lemonade

Let guns be used for hanging raincoats

Let’s pound the bombs till dust be made

Let slugs be beads of anecdote

Let’s erase borderlines with peace

Let war air crafts deliver mail

Let Jews and Arabs exchange gifts and kiss

Let the train of desolation derail

Let warring parties say, ‘I was wrong’

Let nuclear reactors print Christmas songs.

Akpan

A Multitude of Words

In the beginning was talk

Then a multitude of words

Made room for argument

The latter aided by pinpricks

Laid down the rules of engagement

We miss how things

Used to be

When a child was a child

And not a suicide

They got talks on the Middle East

Been trading words since I wore bibs

Peace talks to broker peace choke peace

Now it’s the Arabs

Wanna be starting Jihads

They got Nigeria and Niger

Stomping to the tune of Boko Haram

Sparking BBOGs

Raping, ‘pregnating teens

And we still negotiating…

In the multitude of words

There wanteth not wars.

Akpan

Let's Get Serious And Go To War

Photo Courtesy: UNHCR (modified)

We’ve come too far raise the bar

And erect a gas chamber

Why not toss a bomb

Blow that laughter to kingdom come

Let’s get serious and go to war.

What’s peace

Got to do with't when bliss

Tangos with ignorance

Brotherhood pays penance

We got too much love

To give it snaps the cord

Let’s get serious and go to war.

Drug that wimp

Slug the pregnant bitch

Drown the damn refugee

And put that river on the map

I know you lo’ that

Com’on show me some blood

Let’s get serious and spark a war.

A party ain’t a party

If the war dogs ain’t in it

Get ready to make some noise

Cause the boys gon’ bring their toys

We been having loads of fun

Let’s get serious and throw a war.

Forget breakdancin’

We ammo freelancin’

Bomb some kill ‘em off

An off-the-set James Bond

Don’t show me love

Show me a Kalashnikov

Let’s get serious and bomb the world.

Akpan

Chronic Encore

History is a stuck record

History is on chronic encore

History is recurrent cancer

He asks the question

And he gives the answer,

History is a broken record.

History competes with himself

He strives to best his record best

History is stuck in a flawed groove

Cause history’s got something to prove

History makes the grand opening

He takes the baton in mid-race

And cuts the ribbon at grand closing

History never gives time a break

History is on repeat

Like a radio request hit

He improvises

…and revises

And yet rotates on his axis

So the fallout's always the same

Then begins his game

Like a game of spades

Played for higher stakes

All over again.

Akpan

Gilt-Edged Invitation

I will take you down to where I live
All the way up to the nth degree
I will show you fear in the crannies
The tears on the pillow shed nightly.
I'll give you a blow-by-blow account
Of the kiss-kiss bang-bang downtown.
I will share the dreams I often dream
The waking dreams that's my reality.
I'll take your hope and break it slowly
Like Passover bread we'll eat and weep,
Show you hate in the eyes of a teen
I raise the skirts of a child n' you see
The bombs strapped to her waist set to kill
God's enemies who resist his will.
I will love to show you where I live
You'll want to bleed when you see me bleed.

Akpan

Smoke Up

You can have a cigarette
If you smoke
Like chimneys no regret
Get it tokin.
Have a seat, relax
Throw your feet n' max
Rewind n' unwind
You're fine git your shine.
But let me ask you
What's on the menu?
Do you keep wake to
Think over the blues
Half the world's going through?
News of grave kabooms?
Go on, smoke up
But who does the math?
Ever get hung up
On who bells the cat?
When they throw a war
Who gets the crumb?

Akpan

Connoisseur

In the voice of a refugee who's lost all.

I find refuge within myself

I must turn to nobody else

I got big promises to keep

And no one else will do for me

I harbor solace inside my heart

I must or quit before I start.

I must take this soul odyssey

I must proceed by what I see

And taste and touch, by what I bleed.

I must find refuge within me

I lost it all except for me.

I’ve come from a place of misery

I find refuge within no one,

There is no one who is someone

Who dares lift me outta this one;

I am the reason I go on.

I must seek no source of comfort

Besides the man in the mirror

I severed all ties with this world,

Now I’m a connoisseur in horrors.

Akpan

Undamaged

Lookit all the damage you caused,
You and your band of murderous thugs,
Ever wondered what these could cost?
Guess y'all too busy chucking bombs
To give a damn about lives lost.

You must know we shall not be moved.

Y'all like boys with toys bringing noise;
We rejoice by choice raising our voice.
We are firmly planted like rocks
And we will stand cause we will last
Long after you're stuck in the past.

You must know we shall not be moved.

Akpan

X: Revisited

For the child that died before delivery during a Boko Haram raid of a Borno village.

Half of this hemisphere,
Half of the other;
None of this hemisphere,
None of the other.

Akpan

Dialogue of Bullets

It's sad that Shi'ite leaders got caught in military crossfire. But I think the irony is
how their followers mustered the courage and faced soldiers who were armed with
weapons yet, they've done absolutely nothing about taking Boko Haram insurgents
out of business. A governor of a northern Nigeria state said the sect is spread across
the 19 states in the north of Nigeria... imagine such a formidable force pouring the
measure of wrath unleashed on soldiers out on Boko Haram? This is the kind of
situation that makes you ask, "What's really going on?"

You may write me up on the wall

In blood-dipped paint brush.

But I will rather die in yonder

Inferno than live in mental slavery.

I don't mind been called a hell raiser

But I think ya'll barking up the wrong tree.

While we died none broke the code of silence.

The table turns on you; you resort to violence.

If you'd expressed half the enthusiasm

From the onset of this onslaught for real,

You won't stand on the wrong side of the chasm

Acting out your spiteful hypocrisy.

Why you turn on us? The dogs are out there.

Why drop the attitude when we was bombed?

Who you fooling, why was yous acting scared?

You boldly faced the soldiers armed with slugs.

You shoulda preached that zeal all up the North;

Staged an uprising against calculated terror.

You held your peace when terror cut school kids down;

And they yelling threats from outside our walls, now?

If you wanna bring it, bring it we still here.

We never heard you hate on Boko Haram

Seems when it rains on you your voice comes clear.

Your reaction proved you to be quite an ass.

Akpan

When a Child is Bombed

A rescued Boko Haram child suicide bomber

When a child is bombed

The basis for rejoicing is stolen

The sound of laughter is stilled

Or it falls flat like the cackles of Gollum

On the eardrum making the sense of loss emphatic.

When a child is bombed

There's always an untold story erupting

Within calling out things forbidden to imagine.

A restlessness which amps up the fears of all the years

Confronts our doubts and strips bare our worst nightmares.

When a child is bombed

The weight of a shroud alights and grief is pronounced

As we recall 'tis the season the Christ-child came down.

Peace and goodwill become the substance of a fairytale

And our Xmas wish lists are like statements of how we failed.

Akpan

Christmas in Sambisa

A Christmas tribute to the Nigerian Armed Forces
for their unrelenting war on terrorism

I always had a hunch you was the prototype hero.

Now that I found the unique moment to express that fact

I'm gon' ride on the track and leave none in the dark from the intro

When the tribute engage their ears n' slide down their heart.

I really wanna invest the time to take you apart

And sink my teeth into the details until I feel the heat

Of the battle waging down on the inside as you rip open the enemy

And snatch victory like a trophy from the talons of the beasts.

Bae misses her man; the kids need their dad yet this Xmas

You'll lay down on a bed of grass; rest your head on a pillow of stone

N' if you're lucky sleep will find you cuddling a people's burden in your arms.

Yet no one deserves a better Xmas than the men who went and brought us hope.

You're the one my heart bleeds for it's of you I sing

And I will fear no evil walking thro the forest of Sambisa

Cause the shadow of a soldier supplies all the solace I seek

So let me take this time and shoot you a very merry Christmas.

Akpan

Unalloyed

Recently, the Nigerian military murdered (unintentionally)
some Shiite leaders. This is so they don't lose sight of the
big picture. The fight to end Boko Haram goes on.

The temptation to agree with your critics

Is destroying you gradually

Chewing you up on the inside like cancer;

Introducing rot into your emotional liver.

You don't make progress, brother

Riding one article of other folk's opinion.

But you'll commit blunders

On the most basic of criterion.

You really ought to know better

Ain't nobody taking the fall but you.

Who gets the blame for playing the fool?

They don't give a care

How well you fare.

Just wanna use you

Then they dump you like used up shoes.

Pry your eyes wide

Open brother, gatto be wise.

The night is young

It's the time when stars shine.

Shake off the dust and rise like a song

Flung all the way up to heaven soaring free of compromise

Like a true master of destiny.

And make it your responsibility

To carve out a personal path to glory.

Akpan

Related articles

• Boko Haram attack on three Nigeria villages 'kills 30'
• Latest Boko Haram attack leaves 30 dead, 20 injured
• Nigerian Military Finds Muslim Leader With Bullet Wound Hiding In 'Bunker,' Over 100 Arrested
• 10 killed in Shiite Muslims clash with Nigerian military
• Muslim Terrorists Kill at Least 30, Wound 20 More in Nigeria Attacks

Otherside

Photo Courtesy: UNHCR (@Refugees)
For Syrian Refugees

Will I make it to the otherside?

Beyond this grave of dreams;

That special place where the imagination

Explodes in daylight?

My soul barely exists

Waiting thirstily for the delights

Of fulfillment in a world

Where patience is defeated.

It's hard not to kick against the goads

Cause the times is ill fated.

The quest for glory

Drains me and fills me with rage,

The road to immortality is paved

With hate-induced goals.

Yet mortal men thrust into it blinded

Multiplying well-avoidable throes.

But will I ever fill that space

And appropriately

Obtain the good grace

To equip the man of my dreams

With a tool to win in this spiteful race?

Akpan

Related articles

• Life in a Refugee Camp, As Seen By Children
• 4 charts that will change how you think about Syrian refugees
• The Refugee Crises: Project for Awesome 2015
• UNHCR recommends measures for strengthening security and refugee protection in parallel
• Rethinking Refugee Camps
• Syrian refugees update: a strong ground game abroad means speedy resettlement

The Assassination of X

Sometime in January, Boko Haram terrorists razed a town in
North East, Nigeria killing a 'woman in labor.' In the words of a
witness, “Half of the baby boy (was) out and she died like this.”
This poem is for the unnamed boy who I called 'X.'

And who hears when we call and comes running?

Who waits up for us and keeps the lamp burning

To show the path home when twilight is dawning?

Who reaches out when we face a chasm yawning?

And swoops us up just before we keel over falling

To our deaths in a fissure that is always gnawing?

The value of x is, for all practical purposes, unresolved;

He’ll for all time be a mystery because he died unnamed,

His spot is uninhabited for he never set foot on this sod.

The death of x is, beyond all reasonable doubt, a shame;

Not he or his Mama deserved that baptism in cold blood,

No one will ever know what x was cut out for or his gain.

The tale of x is, contrary to common belief, an ill weapon

To bludgeon the foe cause he died before he came thence,

We can turn pain to gain and make them pay for our loss.

The value of our x they must be made to feel, is priceless.

Akpan