Rant & Rave: A New Age Angelou

I thought I was done for the year until I came across this video. It’s so much fun; using a childhood game to bring to light adult issues of struggle, race and conflict amongst others. I hope you guys like it as much as I do and I promise, I'mreally done for the year after this.

Hughes Corner: Still Here

There's always someone somewhere trying to make the experience of life so much harder for the next person. There's always someone attempting to deter you from your dreams. Sometimes that person is outside of your life and other times that person is yourself. If you live to see another day tell the naysayers that no matter how hard they may try, you are still here.   

My hopes the wind done scattered.
Snow has friz me,
Sun has baked me,

Looks like between ‘em they done
Tried to make me

Stop laughin’, stop lovin’, stop livin’
But I don’t care

I’m still here! Still here!

Hughes Corner: 50-50

Since the death of the Angelou Corner, I’ve struggled to find a poet I like enough to have as a permanent monthly fixture on this blog. I through many a name, I tried to pick based on gender then race, age then relevance and no one struck me hard enough to leave a lasting impression. I finally decided to combine my selection criteria and ended up with Langston Hughes; a black poet and author born in 1902 and died in 1967.

Hope you guys will enjoy him as much as I am right now.  

I’m all alone in this world, she said
Ain’t got nobody to share my bed
Ain’t got nobody to hold my hand—
The truth of the matter’s
I ain’t got no man.

Big Boy opened his mouth and said
Trouble with you is
You ain’t got no head!
If you had a head and used your mind
You could have me with you
All the time.

She answered, Babe, what must I do?

He said, Share your bed—
And your money, too.

Angelou Corner: I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings

I can proudly say i've saved the best for last with this one. 
This will be my last Angelou Corner post and i could not have picked a better one to end of with. I take from the from this piece the want of a being to be without any knowledge of the how and a willingness to grow with an inability to begin the process. the bird does not sit in it's cage dwindling away doing nothing but, it sings in hopes of a better tomorrow. Do the right thing, regardless of your circumstance. 

Please let me know if there are any other poets you would like a feature on. 

The free bird leaps
on the back of the wind
and floats downstream
till the current ends
and dips his wings
in the orange sun rays
and dares to claim the sky.

But a bird that stalks
down his narrow cage
can seldom see through
his bars of rage
his wings are clipped and
his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings
with fearful trill
of the things unknown
but longed for still
and his tune is heard
on the distant hill
for the caged bird
sings of freedom

The free bird thinks of another breeze
an the trade winds soft through the sighing trees
and the fat worms waiting on a dawn-bright lawn
and he names the sky his own.

But a caged bird stands on the grave of dreams
his shadow shouts on a nightmare scream
his wings are clipped and his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing

The caged bird sings
with a fearful trill
of things unknown
but longed for still
and his tune is heard
on the distant hill
for the caged bird
sings of freedom. 

Maya Angelou till the death!!!

Poetic Text: My Business

My business is complex
long winding stealth
crevassed in places untold
gorged and crannied
you would never fully understand

My business is intricate
multipart and composite
it walks and breaths airs of mystery
deep and sordid
lies telling life
that’s my business

My business is convoluted
in tiny pockets, adventure aplenty
Between the thighs of a joyous fate
lives the many myriads of my trade
within my whims and fancies
I am more than a one dimensional being

My business is mine
a secret so close to my bosom
the only way in lives in…
cracks, clefts, holes, splits and hollows
that promise never to allow no one
not even you inside it
you would never fully grasp the sophistication of my business
so mind yours and I’ll do the same 

Angelou Corner: Refusal

Beloved,
In what other lives or lands
Have I known your lips
Your Hands
Your Laughter brave
Irreverent.
Those sweet excesses that
I do adore.
What surety is there
That we will meet again,
On other worlds some
Future time undated.
I defy my body's haste.
Without the promise
Of one more sweet encounter
I will not deign to die. 

Angelou Corner: The Detached

It's amazing how closely I can relate to this woman and her body of work. Every month, through this blog I expose myself to a piece of her poetry and every month I see bits of me and the struggles i'm currently enduring through it. 

I know that soon i'm going to have gone through to large a chunk of Maya's work to continue the Angelou Corner and at that point i'm going to have to focus my attention onto a different poet, but till then i hope both you and I can find refuge in this great writer's words. 

We die, 
Welcoming Bluebeards to our darkening closets, 
Stranglers to our outstretched necks, 
Stranglers, who neither care nor
care to know that
DEATH IS INTERNAL.

We pray, 
Savoring sweet the teethed lies, 
Bellying the grounds before alien gods, 
Gods, who neither know nor
wish to know that
HELL IS INTERNAL.

We love, 
Rubbing the nakednesses with gloved hands, 
Inverting our mouths in tongued kisses, 
Kisses that neither touch nor
care to touch if
LOVE IS INTERNAL. 

Poetic Text: Conflict and Peace

I hope this piece makes sense. It’s written as two different texts but, functions as one and is used to illustrate one central idea.

Conflict

Find comfort in the solace of disdain

Speak of the heart’s sweet contempt

The battle lines are drawn, surrender or wage war

Let the mind sing joy

And the limbs climb the walls of desolate jubilation

Peace

We struggle

Pull at the ugly face of bitter feeling

Grind hard the devastation acquired from desperation

Pound, strike, clobber another man’s elation  

All for the sake of a peaceful aggravation

Angelou Corner: Remembrance

Your hands easy
weight, teasing the bees
hived in my hair, your smile at the
slope of my cheek. On the
occasion, you press
above me, glowing, spouting
readiness, mystery rapes
my reason

When you have withdrawn
your self and the magic, when
only the smell of your
love lingers between
my breasts, then, only
then, can I greedily consume
your presence.

Angelou Corner: They Went Home

I like this piece; it's another one that i can totally relate to.

It's simple and concise yet clear and straight to the point. No lengthy explanations needed for this piece.

They went home and told their wives,
that never once in all their lives,
had they known a girl like me,
But… They went home.

They said my house was licking clean,
no word I spoke was ever mean,
I had an air of mystery,
But… They went home.

My praises were on all men’s lips,
they liked my smile, my wit, my hips,
they’d spend one night, or two or three.
but…

Poetry: I asked God to Help Me Forget You (a reworked version)

Through the misfortune of the current goings on of my life, I finally managed to sit last night and rework this poem. I am still not 100% happy with it but, it speaks my current state of mind so clearly.
here it is, the reworked version of I asked God to Help Me Forget You.

Hope you like it!!!

I spoke to the creator about you
Validated your existence
for the love you gave spoke rapture
living love and running ferociously into forever

A brutal kind of tenderness
you lived between my hopes and wishes
Fuelled flames and prospects
abundantly joyous laughs aplenty
happy easy living in your arms

But, today I prayed
I asked God to help me forget you
The clouds luminous fray and boastful
can we speak to the bad times
insist on them
and term them defining moments

Inside my minds crawlspaces
I want you gone
cause you broke utopia
I want you gone
cause you ruptured arcadia
I want you gone

So I prayed and
I asked God to help me forget you.

Angelou Corner: Alone

Lying, thinking
Last night
How to find my soul a home
Where water is not thirsty
And bread loaf is not stone
I came up with one thing
And I don't believe I'm wrong
That nobody,
But nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.

There are some millionaires
With money they can't use
Their wives run round like banshees
Their children sing the blues
They've got expensive doctors
To cure their hearts of stone.
But nobody
No, nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Now if you listen closely
I'll tell you what I know
Storm clouds are gathering
The wind is gonna blow
The race of man is suffering
And I can hear the moan,
'Cause nobody,
But nobody
Can make it out here alone.

Alone, all alone
Nobody, but nobody
Can make it out here alone. 

Poetry

On the threshold of another life change, with hours to countdown, I found this poem online. I have no idea who the author is but it rang so true to me and my current situation. The journey is unknown and the path has never before been walked but, I pray to God that all goes well.

New Beginings

I see the field where life does grow
in patches green from down below
where now we walk thru seeds once sown
a time of new beginning

We look not back from whence we came
or where we go it's all the same
where life's within a picture frame
in times of new beginning

Hold not for what tomorrow brings
to change your life, so many things
the bell once tolled, no longer rings
for a time of new beginning

Give not to sadness, enjoy the smiles
In fields, once yielded to the plough
come lay with me for just a while
This time of new beginning

So look now deep into my eyes
enjoy this time for how it flies
of gentle moans and tender sighs
for us and new beginnings

Angelou Corner - Weekend Glory

I love the weekends spent with my friends Zizi and Lulu. They make life great and situations that would otherwise be dire are fun, easy and carefree. They inspired this month’s Angelou Corner.

I love you girls, you make my life!

Some clichty folks
don’t know the facts,
posin’ and preenin’
and puttin’ on acts
strechin’ their backs.

They move into condos
up over the ranks,
pawn their souls
to the local banks
buying big cars
they can’t afford
riddin’ around town
actin’ bored.

If they want to learn how to live life right
they ought to study me on Saturday night.

My job at the plant
ain’t the biggest bet,
but I pay my bills
and stay out of debt.
I get my hair done
for my own self’s sake
so I don’t have to pick
and I don’t have to rake.

Take the church money out
and head cross town
to my friend girl’s house
where we plan our round.
we meet our men and go to a joint
where the music is blue
and to the point.

Folks write about me.
They just can't see
how I work all week
at the factory.
Then get spruced up
and laugh and dance
And turn away from worry
with sassy glance.

They accuse me of livin'
from day to day,
but who are they kiddin'?
So are they.

My life ain't heaven
but it sure ain't hell.
I'm not on top
but I call it swell
if I'm able to work
and get paid right
and have the luck to be Black
on a Saturday night.

Poetic Text: When You Love Me

I find love has the ability to speak two different languages, hot and cool, and still sit confident in the knowledge that it is love regardless of what ever else may be going on around it. It is this thought that inspired this poem, i hope you like it.

When you love me
Love me ferociously
brutal passion
The desire, flaming
Cradled skilfully between skin numbing lust
The friction, steady
an influx of mad hunger
Back aching
Thighs scorching
Heart smiling

When you love me
Love me tender
amid long gazes and deep embraces
let me rest easy in the comfort of your presence
restitution inside your arms
A home
Esoterically I find no qualms
Soul nourished
Spirit budding
wonderful in my heart

When you love me
Love me.

.

Poetry: A Love Scene

Going through my laptop last night i found some stuff i had written in 2008 and this is one of them. Thoughts may be the same but, i think the words would be different if i were asked to re-write this poem... anywho, read and (hopefully) enjoy.

An angel derailed by a lonesome burden

Longs for life to meet a pleasure

On paths that wind

To long unheard of nevers

Her mind hoped for a passion unseen

But her misery faded

When in stolen moments her life bypassed meaning

In a shady ally

Where the holy never tread

She found her glory

Tall dark and handsome

Looking rather scary

But when he spoke

It was evidence of God making an attempt at poetry

 

Engraved on lust, a want for the flesh

It was on a street corner that they met

Where love intersected passion

Life met pleasure

Giving birth to a tale

The first scene had begun

When he took the bait the fantasy could not fall through

 

I would spell it out but I know you’re not dump so…

One two

Skip a few

Scene four began with a knock on her door

 

Fade to black

A lover’s moan

The lights return

They lay in a pool of touchy feely

My dad would kill me

Though I am not sorry

I love you

I love you

I do

 

Still he caressed her feelings

Though ripe with the sensuous healing

Felt only when you hear a woman gasping and breathing

I love you

I love you

I do

 

They had become a meaning

A word defined as a definition

Travelled to places where shooting stars shoot at ones will

And rosy cheeks are a felt feeling

He loved her

She loved him

They did

Poetry - I asked God to help me forget you

I asked God to help me forget you
The clouds luminous fray and boastful
Can we speak to the bad times
Insist on them
and term them defining moments

I spoke to the creator about you
Validated your existence
For the love you gave spoke rapture
Living love and running ferociously into forever

This is a little something I have been working on for a while now, it is still far from completion (I think) but I really wanted to share it as is echoes the going-ons of my heart and my head so profusely.
I won’t get all self-explanatory or whatever… Read and hopefully enjoy, also, let me kno what you think.  

Poetry - These Relationships

The metaphors contained within the poem are seen from the first line which speaks of eyes crawling and in the sixth line another metaphor is found telling of a dying that is dangling. The poem is ambiguous in that it provides double meaning to aspects of the poem such as the scorched womanhood, this could mean either that this ‘womanhood’ is used up and dry or that it has nothing to offer these people that are devouring it. Line four which reads ‘these eyes growing in my thighs’ serves two purposes; one to change the tone of the poem and two to introduce an intrusion that the poem’s narrative voice finds foreign, maybe alluding to her virginity and it’s being taken. 

These Relationships

Eyes crawling up on me

I glistened

Honestly delighted, I am desired

What are these eyes growing in my thighs?

Devouring with the greatest of ease, my scorched womanhood

This dying dangling between my legs

Weaving on the framework of my existence, a burdened smile

It was always in the words of these God-forsaken men

I based the value of my self worth

William Blake's London

This poem, vivid and stinky and dirty in its narrative, does more than tell of the over-crowded London streets, prostitution and the bitter sadness contained within Blake’s hometown, it also speaks with marred passion provides the reader insight into the economical, political and human relation aspects of a life lived in the 1700s

Enjoy!!!

London

I wander thro’ each charter’d street,
Near where the charter’d Thames does flow,
And mark in every face I meet
Marks of weakness, marks of woe.
 
In every cry of every Man,
In every Infant’s cry of fear,
In every voice, in every ban,
The mind-forg’d manacles I hear. 
 
How the Chimney-sweeper’s cry
Every black'ning Church appalls;
And the hapless Soldier’s sigh
Runs in blood down Palace walls.
 
But most thro’ midnight streets I hear
How the youthful Harlot’s curse
Blasts the new-born Infant’s tear
And blights with plagues the Marriage hearse.

Maya Angelou's Still I Rise

Still I Rise

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin' in my own back yard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.

Maya Angelou