I would have played the sweetest of tunes then for you
but boils erupted all over the lips of my flute
and malicious termites mangled its delicate throat
Santos, the song I had hoped to play for you
must await another season when these sobs that clog and choke my throat
these blocks that freeze my heart and voice
slowly clear up
in the season of waiting, dry and lean,
O very Santos,
Dimkpa asa,
only this pool of red tears is the voice of my song of sorrow.
(on the pains of child mortality)
She walks with slow dignity
Feet as lead, soul as stone
auto-pilot, behind him on this long last mile
a dark strangling walk, unfitting end to a journey
that had commenced with songs and stars
a mother’s heart frozen cold, numb
as sorrow scorches and freezes her
all at once her to the core
of her being
No tears flow now
“He would not want me to cry in the public
Even though this mile I walk behind and with him
should be his to walk for me”
she dreads the end
the sight of another mother opening to receive and enfold him
the sound as shovelled in loose earth
draws the blinds forever
the tumbling sands drown her prayers
for the father’s bosom
to welcome this pilgrim
who returned too early
and as she prayed
the welled up tears, push down the barriers
of soul destroying composure
and cascade, the heaving sobs and wails from
a shattered mother
shattering the solemn calm of a painful goodbye
Reflections 