By Noel Ihebuzor
Seduction,
words, glances, gestures
and signs all singing innocence,
guile innocently garbed in see-through lace, wonyosi,
seeds laced and laden with suggestion
of slow gentle adduction
consensual abduction,
mutual attraction, prehensile and tensile,
O youth, shine your eyes,
read the small print
approach with caution, resist acceleration
to end points and end games
steeped in action, multiplication, addition,
and deception and substraction.
By Noel Ihebuzor
Punctuations speak and sing.
They hum breaks, pauses and stops.
Shapes float and dance and whisper meanings,
in their shy whispers and gentle murmurs, yet audibly
spoons are no longer just for the table,
even if they still collocate with meals and eating
in these new fresh environments
all descriptive and so so suggestive
*** prompted by a lovely little poem written by SLD
Susan L. Daniels and Noel A. Ihebuzor
before Babel
maybe
there was a word
for this me you raise
not from anything dead
but sleeping
& deep
this me that answers
& opens
throating
every word
ever spoken
in any language
before and beyond Babel
that silent voice bubbles on
bounding and bouncing
in bundles of beautiful
babble that unbundle, bare
and bond me
with no words spoken
not needing nor heeding
any spoken word
simply
because your silence speaks
more than all words
it undoes me
my unfurled feelings
amplifying the unspoken,
filling my being with soft echoes
of sounds stronger than words
***Another spontaneous duet this week. Susan (italicized) and I (regular text) had a conversation in poetry following my comments on her poem. The result is this wonderful and warming duet! Thanks Susan–as always, a pleasure to volley lines with you!
By Noel Ihebuzor and Susan Daniels
seduction is best when done softly, slowly
and yes, subtly–
to lead entranced
an entrancing partner (not necessarily
all that innocent – intent and consent in a closet slightly ajar, and ever opening)
to fascinate, to suggest, but all so quietly
to the point the seduced
owns it as their idea, not yours
when it seeps slowly into anxious fevered body,
when the pores, the ears, the eyes, the lips, all sip it,
inhaling its suggestive velvety boldness like ripe brandy
Armagnac, please;
or perhaps something scented
of late summer; like pear, apple,
blackberry, but intoxicating
and strong, sweetness with heat
swimming into mind and body both
exhaling and uncoiling
in recognition of joint and multiflavored complicity
saluting coyness and salivating and waiting
yes, art. art spun by two.
a peacock has nothing on us, love,
fanning feathers to dazzle, but that’s all he has.
you bring and I welcome that drunkenness,
that reeling magic we stumble inside
and going with the flow, each new seduction
increasing flush, gush..and rush,
cascades beckoning and willing rowed to
seduction is best when done softly, slowly
*** Just back from a one month vacation where I visited family and friends in the UK and Nigeria. Back to base in Dar, it was fun to get to chat with my duet partner, Susan and to exchange views on life, literature and living with her. This poem, a duet, came up in a spontaneous manner during our chat this afternon on facebook, completely unplanned and we agreed to upload as is – hope you like it. Susan is italicized, and my words are bolded.
By Noel Ihebuzor
Surveying his still and lean frame
I still and steel myself
trying to dam the hot streams seeking release
I lean back in time and spare tear drenched thoughts
to visit with his past before his still present
and survey a future without his comforting presence
The little boy besides me clutches my hands
all grief and bewilderment, suddenly thrust into adulthood yet a child,
struggling to be brave and I too struggle to be brave for him
holding his hands as we both struggle to suffocate the pain that seeks to suffocate us
and my thoughts tumble, my words stumble,
my mind wobbles as do my legs on this walk of farewell
a slow walk of love, honor, respect and remembrance
molten waves of sorrow scorch me as I walk and gaze
As I gaze on him and remember, and recall and re-live….
Santos, Santos the gbogbo di gbogbo
Dimkpa asa, okunrin meta,
“One Naze man at a time”
Okunrin dara, nwoke obioma, ome nwanne….
O very very Santos Achuku
Not you to enjoy the spare rib
when ribs stare at one from withering rib cages
not for you the lean prime cut
when the world bulges in the middle with the
withered frames of lean children,
soon to be cut off in the prime of childhood
lean as thin drying and dying sticks
stick children with sagging skins
which cling like dirty sack cloths to the tiring bones
Oh, Santos , how often did we rage at a deaf drunken and indifferent world
and for you, Santos, action was also soothing
and so, willingly at Lekki, Tere-Ama, okorieukwu and beyond,
he lent his throat to voice their pain
with no thought of gain
save to soften their pain and to soften his too
and soothe the pains of separation he bore
gladly he lent his time, his mind, his voice, his frame
that theirs may grow
that smiles would grace their faces
I sing for you Santos
You who now sing no more
For you Santos who loved life
but for whom songs for others was
vital for the vibrancy of your own songs
and for the voices you missed so
I sing for you Santos
I sing my sorrow and your grief
I sing for those voices,
voices whose touches you missed and still miss
those voices who are unable to sing,
suppressed, silent, sad,
subdued and sullen
I sing for the hard of heart, haters and hatters
hard nuts, twisted and knotted
I sing Santos knowing that that your charity beams on them,
your arms of embrace still open to welcome though you be still
Chi anyi di nma, Uchechi ga eme, Chi anyi ji oke and though some may think it is dark, bright days await you….
Gingerly tenderly, I caress your presents
this endless present,
a past that lives, heaves and breathes
and a future that glows and beckons
The three time frames, yet a continuity, endless
O very Santos, you came, you lived, you loved and you live on
the road you walk is smooth, your path is good, Uzoma
no stomps graze your feet as winged creatures lift you
lead and accompany you to the warm welcome of His bosom and light.
**** This is one of my clumsiest songs. I wrote it in 2009 for my late elder brother and friend, Valentine Uzoma Ihebuzor – ( I called him Santos and still do! ) after we had committed his mortal remains to mother earth in my father’s compound in the village! Santos sleeps right next to his bedroom window and the sands of my village lie gently on him! Today is three years since that committal! Up Santos!
By Noel Ihebuzor and Susan Daniels
Lately, conversations,
learned or elementary
about quantum entanglements
resonate & bring to mind
you
rich in kinks and curves
to the eyes straight
mirrors of us imperfect in perfection
reluctantly splitting in medium dense
elegance bending in fine angles
And tonight I lose sleep
to deep speculation
wondering at which point
and how
particles of pure energy
roaming space free, opening places
penetrating spaces and crevices
the flowing and roaming particles of
our matter collided
breaking barriers
upper and lower limit
vibrating stream of energy
yes, streams that crashed
and colluded
to synthesize
this synchronized turn
& counter-turn
between us
how across distances
the color of angel robes
the bow of the sky
this awareness continues
bundles of colors at different energy levels
streaming to lighten, to loosen
a delight
past an elemental level
indefinite until measured
** As usual, It was such wonderful fun doing this duet with Susan where we explore the relevance of aspects of particle theory in physics to communication and bonding across space, place and cultures. Susan says it better in her usual eoquence in the words below. Noel
***Quantum entanglements, or the theory of, was the inspiration for this duet between my bolded friend and I (italicized). I believe it describes nicely a friendship and affinity that stretches across the globe 
As always, hope you enjoy our fuzzy, fizzy exploration between particles and people — I know I had fun writing it with Noel, hope you enjoy reading it.
Amicabe duel
of giving and taking
lines, ideas, voices
colliding and colluding,
sometime skipping along gaily
sometime contrasting, sometime complementing
always enriching,
wafting and walzing with mounting additionality,
perfuming the sky with rhythm!
By Susan Daniels and Noel Ihebuzor
All life is motion compelled to move;
you and I, we must move too
even in apparent stillness
our atoms vibrate
past vision and all senses, rearranging with
the simple harmonic motion of elements,
the inner rotation of the subatomic
like mirrored, miniature solar systems
the shift of season into season,
the pulls tides answer, and strokes of waves
all singing life
every motion has brought us
closer to this motion today
where we move in unison
your voice in mine and
mine in yours
your tongue vibrates, feels
and feeds my throat motion;
fluttering, trembling, all kinetic and stirring
and we move, the rhythm of us a motion
born of force and attraction
by polarities that pull
create this swirl, tremulous gyrations, vibrating, oscillating
where merging in vertical and horizontal flows
we reach forward and beyond
with hastening speed
and now, with vectors charting
direction, force and magnitude
this joined velocity singing and ringing
still accelerating, celebrating
the influx and efflux of creativity,
its season of release
** Our second duet on Motion! Susan and I hope you will enjoy reading this duet as much as we did writing it. Susan is italicized and Noel is bolded.
We drift in habitual wobbling circles
hobbling like feet poorly cobbled, feeling
neither earth nor one another, stranded
arid motion free stretch of ever elongating slippery
quicksand highway, without grip or traction
Smiles stiff and still
not sparking eyes, sparkleless
exhausted, shambling, soulless routines once so fresh
now stale, sour, and old
constant motion long past dancing
Radius, diameter and circumference in grating logic
circling each other in yawning cycles
We roll unresisting into a heavy, unpiloted slide
remaining in these present states easier
as with each change comes resistance
which must be swept across
or persuaded into action
what is held still craves flow,
though frozen and powerless
to break old bindings
and change direction
We shuffle limp on a limping highway
limp unable to rise nor flow, trudging on a treadmill
threadbare, going nowhere
The mournful sky wraps above and around us
mourning our uninspired mornings
soggy flat in colorless monochrome
borderless without hope, our soulless soles
burdened, weighty and weighed down
at the border of the deadening present and a feared future
Eager to depart, move on and move apart
and resist its own yearning,
and though we have breath and pulse, we lie inert
The half-life of what lived long past
in search of direction,
going nowhere, unable to live
unwilling to leave
Habit a tripwire trapping our feet,
a seething past that teemed,
boiling over, over-run with energy heaves,
now idles
empty of steam and wind
With no wand to wave to will us forward
we live as hollow shells
in endless cycles of repetitions
that weep and
wait for that external force to move us
either backwards or forward,
to push us on or push us over Inertia
**While a pleasure, as always, to write with Noel, I can’t wait to move on to more dynamic physical concepts in this series we are working on
Again, Noel’s voice is not italicized, mine is. (Susan)
****Susan and I explore in this duet a concept in physics that dates back to Newton’s seminal work. Inertia is essentially about the inability of an entity for internally generated change and movement in the absence of external impetus. It is a great joy to feel how in this duet we have been able discover some life and truths about life in Inertia! Always a pleasure to sing with Susan and to feel her voice, soft and delicate, blend with mine, gruff and often strident! (Noel)
By Susan Daniels and Noel Ihebuzor
Noel: If distances were not as long as dark lonely nights
Susan: The callous earth sees to it
that even our nights and days
oppose one another;
but, let us ignore laws of geography and physics
for this moment, and meet.
Noel: If feet could leap distances
ferried and nourished by fertile faith
if minds could travel long distances to their longings
Susan: Then I would fly to you, heedless of gravity, and mocking it;
the sky, neither night or day where we would answer each other
would blush, rivaling the colors of dawn, or of sunset, at our defiance
of the order of things, our audacity.
Noel: If mind, soul and body could paddle silvery
in soft warm lagoons
in canoes invisible to the uninitiated
Susan: Only light the way for us to find each other
Noel: If the journey of exploration
was a journey into the deep self
one of discovery and recovery
Susan: We would range farther
than the resonance of dream language,
sparks dancing past matter,
to a place where twin flames
recognize one other
and blend.
Noel: Would these harsh beginnings
not signal new becomings
and perfection end points
if only we
you and I could kill present addiction
to birth a future full that whispers and beckons
if, if you could, if we could
Susan: We would,
and in our waking walk together
generate something live
from these whispered ifs;
a pale hope, and fragile
unfurls into full-blown being;
yes, hope can dream and bring forth joy
as it breaks and buries bitterness.
Noel: If we could reach within ,
to find that lock to unlock a door
that holds us prisoners,
bound and shackled,
then we would unlock us
this us that currently
glides and drifts, inviting,
suggesting
Susan: Only unchain us,
that we might taste
even a tenth of what tempts us
into crossing these lines
of time, of space,
of who we are now
and who we could become.
***All I am going to say about this is wow, we did good duet, Susan! Can’t think of anything else to add that wasn’t said above – well except, powerful!
Reflections 