My Journey to Nigeria: August 9, 2007

I was greeted back home withe the immense smell of the city we call Lagos.

As I alighted from the airplane surrounded by the throng of human beings I realized that I was indeed home. Everyone around me seemed either tired or irritated and seemed to be on the phone. Here I stood for two whole minutes in the center of the lobby just taking in the busy scene around me before an "Oga sa" in military uniform said "Ejo, aunty can you move other people need to pass" inturrupting my momet of reflection. It was only eight years ago that I stood in the same lobby and yet everything looked the same...

I quickly scurried to join the line of people making thier way to customs.

As we stood in line one of the "professionals" as we will dub him felt it necessary to point out that the light above the customs boothe was out

Professional: We are really back home in Nigeria where everything doesn't work
Military Man: Excuse me sah, can you get in line if you are not a citizen of nigeria?

Professional: Oga, why is it that you cannot put a new light bulb in the overhead light
Civi Servant: Well, we have requested it and no one has responded
Professional: So you cannot afford a light bulb
Military Man: Please sir can you get in line?
Civil Servant: I am just a civil servant sir, just trying to do my job.
Professional : And so? This is the first place that people coming from other countries will see. The first impression of our country shouldn't be that we cannot afford light bulb (people begin to laugh in agreement)
Civil Servant: Well since you are speaking sir, why don't you send money from America and fix the light bulb? Eh? You get mouth just because you landed from Yankee. Because we never leave this place? Are you doing my job....(and he began to wash the man in abuse)

Welcome home!!

Finally going through customs and getting my luggage, I sauntered out and heard my name "Poetic" I turned and there standing in all his cuteness was my Dad. I ran and hugged him leaving my luggage dead smack in the middle of the road. Thankfully, my father who frequents the airport for international travel was able to accust my luggage before the "owners" took a hold of my property.

We quickly "settled" the people and headed home.

I will not regale you on the crazy ass driving in Nigeria and lack of traffic laws or the poverty just outside the gates of our home but i will tell you about the palm trees, the sweat smell of lagos gutters (lol) I joke. I will tell you about my home. Nothing has changed. We pulled into the parking lot and into the driveway and amid me dancing in front of the house with my father and all his freinds that were waiting to welcome me, amid the music and the food and the "iyawo ti de oh" amid all of that, I just started crying. Why?

I was finally home.

My mom arrived a few minutes later and well the rest I leave till tomorrow....

Incomplete Joy

I am the camera that sits
On the three legs of a Tripod
Each leg so easy yet so different
Decorated in different colors
Coming in different flavors
Yet in some miraculous way
They have held me up for over twenty years
I really on them for joy
I lean on them for aid
They bring me out of my debt
My loneliness
My depravity
Because of their support
Because of their strength
I am able to sit on the top of the world

That is how I really feel about my sisters

I return home soon
A land that I left with my support system
A land that I fled because I wanted to be free
I embraced the freedom given to me
By those who chose to use education
To trap me in a box
I allowed the land of the free slaves
To rape me of my love for who I was
Until
I met the center and core of me
The lens that opened my eyes to the beauty around
Zoomed and kept in focus my dreams
Kept in focus my reality
Aided in viewing the world around for what it was
Showed me that home is the root
Home is the core
Home is me

That is how I feel about my hubby to be

So my happiness should be complete
I have my lens that shows me reality
I have my support that elevates me above the world
And I return home to my roots
Not so
In returning home to my roots I leave behind
Two legs of my tripod
Now I ask you this
How do I stand?
How do I remain elevated?
How is my joy supposed to be complete
When only one leg competent leg
Is doing the work of three
Vixen, Menty
The day will never be complete
Without you

Unfinished Poem Part 1

I used to crave you
That is right
The idea of you would make my skin prickle
Tingle with excitement
I used to watch ebony skin meet skin
And from the silence in my room
I used to gaze at the eyelids closed
So deep in sleep
I used to want you
In my core I would feel the burning
The haunting emotion that only
One whose passion matches mine
Can erupt
I used to need you
Like the thirsty traveler after a long journey
By body soul and mind needed the touch
The words
The constant feel and embrace
I gaze into this mirror
And know that I can no longer have you

Did You Miss Me

Hello fans!!!
I am back. Got caught up in work and wedding planning. Do I have stories for you? Yes I do So here are a few thoughts roaming in my mind thatI thought to pour out to you.

What Have I Been Up To?
The word engulfs me as I stare at what I have become
At what I have allowed you to do to me
Me the sun! Have bent to you the earth
Begun to do your will
Become your beck and calling card
To humanity
All because of seniority
I the heavens
Gaze and respect you the earth
What rubbish
I a god who breathes life from her nostrils
Spits fire from her lips
And allows the nations to spring from her womb
Must now humble myself at your feet
And cry
Allowing you to control me
I sit here and ride the train of fate
The train that many ride and begin
The slave trade of my mind
Every sweat that I break on my brow
The time wasted staring at the screen
Putting money in the pockets
Of the slave traders
I have become the reincarnation of everything
That I don’t stand for
I am now a member of the race
That I silently scoff at
Here with my laptop briefcase caring self
I am now “Corporate America”

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The Graduate

Five long years
Interesting how they rush by
And yet I stand before you a stronger person
Not because of that peice of paper you just handed me
Thinking that peice of paper defines me
Not because I hear the cheers of friends and family
Because thinking they define me is false as well
No!
I stand here because
Five years ago a little girl promised her mother
That she would walk down that road
Hold her head high and attian that dream that most found
Easy to reach
I stand here because as I take that step
From student to teacher I have learned
More from life than this piece of paper
Will ever signify
I have learned that life is not ABC but BJZD
I have learned to take risks with love
And put faith in your own abilities
I have learned that though people
Judge me and take a look
window shopping in my existence
I am still precious
I still a queen I am still the one
And only me
I have realized that no goal is unattainable
Find and seek what you love
And love with all your heart
No sacrifice is to great
No love to small
No heart to big
No mind to simple
No person is beyond this world
So don't take that paper and think it defines me
Don't think this moment defines who I am
Take a real look in my eyes
More is yet to be embraced
Because this element
that we call my life
Was written in my cells
Long before you knew you were going to have me momma
Long before you realized you loved her papa
Long before people came around and called me
Sister, friend, lover and soulmate
Long before spirit and flesh became one in my mother's womb
No!
My heritage is the rebirth of some spirit
That knows no end
And I have come into my own
And allowed the real spirit
The heritage of God's and ancient warriors
To unite and conquer all
So take that middle class small minded America
I made it! before you even existed
I am me! I got the paper but the paper doesn't define me
I define me
I made it!
I always have and always will!

The Beginning of the End...The End of a Beginning

At one point I stopped and listened
To the hungry beating of my heart the
Eratic moment when I stood in a place and committed
My mind to attianing my goal
The limit written in the illustrious DNA that you gave me
To bear fruit of a mind robbed of a future
But when I experienced that moment
And actually listened to the stillness
Heard the words of long forgotten blood lines
Women under the sun who wore thier skin colors proud
Yet hung to the slavery that being human creates
Taking moments in time they prayed for opportunities
The way I cried for the beginning to become my end
And end all beginnings
At that point when the silence called me to bow my head
In reverence to the ancestrial tree
That delivers within
All these elements combined cause me to pause and realize
I have only ended my beginning and begun to live the end
This is it
This moment of reverence and stillness
This hallow, shallow existence that was created
When my spirit chose to reincarnate itself
Into this tomb called life
This is the moment that will change all moments
The bridge now crossed, I glance back and wonder
How could I have ever doubted
That the end of my beginning would ever come?

Please Love Me...

Please love me

Love me the way you loved me
When you first laid eyes on me.
You know the slow realization that sent flutters down your spine.
The way you couldn't take your eyes off me.
Let me feed your mind the way I did before.
When my thoughts captivated you,
Made you want to stay on the phone.
When my opinions made love to your senses and you longed for the
Difference I could bring to your life.

Please love me

Love me the way you loved me when you first held me in your arms.
Hold me again to your warmth and crush my soul to yours
Till there is no definition of who we are.
Let me teach you to kiss my heart the way you taught me to kiss yours.
When all it took was a look a touch or a word
And you would smile.
The secret thoughts that you possessed for me that
Ran through each longing look.

Please love me

Don't let the love we feel,
Fade, don't let's let it go...take me to
new heights, there is nowhere I am not willing to go.
I surrender all but
I need you to let go too. . .

Can You See Me?

I see what I want to see
When I see me
In my minds eye
I stand in front of the mirror
Ebony skin
Glaring back at me
Like the silky layers
Of the clay colored ground
Backed to hardness by the sun
Layers of time
Which are etched in the contours of my body
By my ancestral Heritage
Dating back to the times
Of my fathers land, Nigeria
Yoruba
My mind has now forgotten
As I glare at what I have become
What this land
The American Dream
Has made me
I see what I want to see
When I see me
Like the eyes
Dark and blazing
Piercing through the dark
Eyes so deep
Showing wells of sorrow
And time etched
By and in a face
The lines of the Face
That shows years of heartache
Heart,
Break,
Breaking,
Suppression, Depression,
As I yearn for the innocent
Days
Before my ambition raped me
Of my pure honesty
I see what I want to see
When I see me
The countless hours of starvation
Fasting, regurgitating
Till blood rich and red
Pours like milk from my belly
And in the still less ness of the night
I cry out in agony
At the emptiness of my home
Home
Home
Home
A word now foreign to me
As I see
No rest
In this expanse of furnishing
As I left freedom
And came here
To the land of the free
Slaves
I see what I want to see
When I see me
Robbed of innocence
Now I must stare at this person,
This being
Created not by God’s design
But the designs
Of me
Ashamed of myself
Myself ashamed of I
Subject to circumstance
And here she stands
Staring at the past
Faced with the future
Afraid
Afraid to live on
To move from this spot
A spot
Where reality interchanges
With dreams
What was a dream?
I see what I want to see
When I see me
I see no beauty
I see no reason to live
I see a no Queen,
But a being
Starving to be accepted
By family, by love
By friends
I see what I want to see
Can you see me?

Goodbye and Broken Bond

There was a time I thought I couldn't’t breath
I thought that the very touch of air within my lungs
The very intake of any substance
Into my body would end me
Because you were no longer in my life
I thought that I would stop living
Stop loving, stop laughing
That the me, the I , that sums up You
Was all I had
But then all it took were
“Good bye” and “You are not my friend”
For me to realize that those were the words
My soul should have heard
When you first said “Hello” and “I Love You”
How does real love die
Even with betrayal
I didn’t betray you
I didn’t leave you when you had nothing
I didn’t make you cry and wonder at night
Where real friendship went
You may be in the pit now
You may be screaming into your pillow at night
Wondering why your world seems to be falling
Into this abyss that you,
have chosen this path you

Have created
But little do you know
That I am lying in bed at night
Not sleeping
Dreaming but not shutting my eyes
Searching my soul for a way
To ask you what I have done to be treated such
I have stood there when others fell
I have given you my honest love
Yet you feel it is your position
To tell me
Adios, from that high perch that you placed yourself
Well my dearest,
You have only this moment to shine
Some gems disperse and are never found again
So this is a good bye
From that one time hello that could have lasted
Lasted an eternity
That you placed me in
This eternity of never to be’s
How does it feel to know
That You betrayed what could have been a friendship
That lasted forever
I never will trust another feline
I will never give my undying love
My honest heart
To a friend
When that friend will only walk away
Take and take and manipulate
Use, abuse, scorn
Turn love to discord
I’m done
With what ever part of me is left
For you to grasp,
Is that a gasp I hear in my mind
No it is a sigh
Of relief
I needed to breath in that air that I thought
With you in my life I couldn't’t attain
Reach, in hale, take in
Exhaled you are and inhaled life, new love
New friends,
I think not..
Here I am now
I
Search for the hate that could never have been found
Had she, had he, had they not said this and that
To make and break and ensure that
The wall built crumbled under the breath
And air that proceeded from the mouth
Of the un blessed and un sanctified
NEVER AGAIN!!
Yet even now I still feel you
In me with me shall I say to be said?
That you are still there, NO
But am I still there, perhaps in my mind,
Perhaps its that scar
That burns now
Underneath all that resentment, anger and hurt
Perhaps the wound is so deep that It can never heal
Perhaps
But then again, maybe
For the first time
I understand what it means
To have loved, to have lost and to have gained
A better knowledge that some angels
Fade and some remain
It all depends on what the mission
Of that angel was in your life, I
Discuss this with Me and I
The other persons in my triangle of
Self
Control
I think not, but then again, you and I
Where never meant to be
A perchance encounter
Turned to friendship
Turned to mush
Turned to trust?
Hmmmm, maybe
Turned to love
Turned to hate
Turned to hurt
Turned to goodbye
Turned to never
Again,
Never
Again, never again
Amen..
As you have said goodbye to your once in a lifetime friend!

The Seeker

I am searching for words now to tell you what I feel
I am searching for the feeling you need from me
I am searching for understanding
I am searching for understanding me
I am searching for that part of you that I seem to be missing
I am searching for that part of me you need
I am searching for the part of me you are missing
I am searching for what I seem to lack
I am searching for what I know I have failed at.
I am searching my heart to not fail me in my need
I am searching for your heart to not fail me in your need
I am searching for space
I am searching for time
I am searching for time and space to become one and bring me to you
I am searching for the captor
I am searching for the captive
I am searching for the captor who took me captive
I am searching for love
I am searching for hope
I am searching for the hope that love has not been lost yet
I am searching for the feelings
I am searching for the knowledge
I am searching for the knowledge that the feelings are still there
I am searching for an answer
I am searching for your face
I am searching for the your face in my dreams
I am searching for the fulfillment of my emptiness
I am searching for the end to the tears
I am searching for you…

Where did you go? Tell me… so I can stop searching for you…

Mhmmmm Delicious Slumber...

His eyes on my face as I slept
I heard them move over my body
A chill ran up my spine as I felt his fingers
So gently brush my check
Paradise my mind screamed at me
Could never taste better
Than when his lips covered mine in ecstasy
I watched his body burn with need
As he pulled a blanket of flesh over me
He whispered the words through his skin
As heat met heat
As passion met passion
As life met life
I listened to the rustle between his lids
As they lay heavy with desire
I gasped at the strength
I now possessed between my folds
He lay siege to my lips
And tortured my every pore
Oh! The want of knowing he knows
That that kiss to my collar bone would make me scream
The knowledge that when he pulls his tongue
Over my gentleness
That I will scream
The knowledge that when he moves against me
That I will want nothing more
And yet he remains that pillar
Ever careful
Lying here now
I whisper through aching fingers
“I want you”
..the phone rings
I hear a voice on the line
I turn
And realize
It was another dream…

How Deep Can I can...?

Drop me now
Drop me now into this abyss that I seem to crave
Where I can never feel hurt, anger
Suppress this depression that seems to surmount
Any desire that I may feel
Wash me
Wash me now in this milky white life
That seems to be the very example everyone wants me to be
I seem to be
The living example of how not to be
Leave me
Leave me now in my own pity
Let me choke on what I want to be
And how I can never become who I should be
Drown me
Drown me now in complacency
I have no where to go but down a road
I wish I didn’t have to walk
Allow me
Allow me now to look down the road at the years
I will waste never knowing how good it would have been
To succeed at what life has played me
Kill me
Kill me now as before I kill what little part of me
Is remaining to love, to be loved
I am nothing
I am forgotten, forsaken, forlorn
A fugitive of my own minds description
Of what this life ought to be
I child brought only to torment what is left
Of this angel’s breathe
Kiss of the god’s they called it
A curse of the scorned is more like it
Life…a game you play once
I have lost, before it began…

The Next Day

The midnight sun is gone
Yet we are afraid to talk or move on.
We avert eyes, knowing the pain each will hold
We keep heads down, not wanting to search our souls
Pretending today is any better than the last
We walk about the room
Keeping our words crisp and brass
You ask me if we will see again
I answer, "I don't know".
Putting on clothes torn in haste
You pretend it doesn't hurt when I begin to go
Reaching out you touch me and begin to speak
My fingers touch your lips and ask you to cease
The cobwebs have already been spun,
The bloodstained evidence undone
We part ways now, having lost our innocence
Another friendship is torn to shreds

The Dance

The Dance begins
Our air lies thick with the hot smell
The scent of bodies touching bodies
And heat rises in curls
From the contact of skin to skin
Sweat falls in droplets
Making pools in bras, streaming down thighs
Tongues move provocatively over soaked skin
Body to body, heat to heat
And still we move on,
The music entwines, circles,
Captures each action we make
Creating the rhythm, the essence of our unity
I hear the seductive whispers in my ear
I feel the steely grips of your arms
You hand languidly gliding across my back
Reaching and searching between my legs
Heart to heart, soul to soul
And yet we move on
Dancing our dance, making our song.

Beauty in Dying

The laughter of the crying brook
The whispering in the roaring winds
The silent pleading of a joyous sun
The bright colors of a cloudy sky
The tender falling of a broken leaf
The crushed glory of a fading rose
The still cracking of the fragile twig
The smile of a sorrowful moon
The sweet lullaby of the rambunctious stars
The changing faces in the leaves of an evergreen
The peace of a weeping night
The warmth of the cold mornings
The coolness of a balmy day
The frenzied sweep of the winter solstice
The happy farewell of autumn�s feathery time

The oxymoron of extravagant colors bringing in the season
Reminds me there is beauty in dying

The Evolution of Me

Sometimes to deal with what you are you must first deal with your ....

Anger
The power of the emotion to submerge you
In your own self loathing and frustration
You pace the halls of your home
Letting out steam by screaming into the silence
of the walls
Resounding back with echoes of the aches you feel
Deep down in your soul
You reach in and gasp at the pain
That the betrayal cost
How dare you lie to me?!

Denial
The force of flashbacks as memories
Float through the kaleidoscope of human pictures
In your mind
You try to find the connection between what could have been
How it could have been
Impossible your mind adds photographs of time and words
How dare you not trust me

Depression
The tears flow as you struggle with what emptiness
Your life must look like
To those fools window shopping in your existence
You submerge your spirit in yourself
As you curl in fetus positions in your heart
You realize that you have been betrayed
You have been taken advantage of, you contort
Your mind around the present and relax into
The bottom of the bottle,
How dare you use me?!

Acceptance
The release of the mind rolled with the
Release of self you cut yourself with religious stain of glass
Puritan spirit you finally deal with the now
The then, the when, the hows are answered
Within minutes, you pick the shattered pieces of
What you will be,
Trusting your ether for daily sustenance
You take one day at a time
Breathing in you are finally come to terms with the you
you gave him...her...them...
How dare you leave me?!