Africa is history, Africa is culture, Africa is legacy. The continent that needs no other continent to function if only we were allowed to manage and control our resources as Africans. Africa is the lightning that brings the rain.
The poem called Society’s Creed. It speaks about a host of the social issues that plague our society as depicted by a news briefing I happened to watch one evening.
How many times have we heard or read about the preventable deaths of people and changed the channel or flipped to the next page as if the deaths of human beings deserve no attention? This is true for many people.
These lines are so evocative, here is a love that withholds nothing and l literally hear that beautiful, precious alabaster box/life breaking whenever l read these lines.
I love love love the poems of Mary Oliver. Like me, she has spoken about her love for the poetry of Rumi. You can see it in her use of simple yet effective imagery and her clear descriptions of love. Her poem Wild Geese is one that I often share, write into cards and letters and even recorded myself reading to send to my mum when she was having a difficult day.
I am a bird. I often fly too high into the sky, get too close to the sun. My wings melt, and I crash into the sea. Perhaps I drown, salty water filling my lungs. But I always rise again. Eternal.
(Our) enemy is really ‘the numbers’ in any situation, where our voice is drowned by those who outnumber us, who make us feel bad about who we are, how we feel, especially how we put so much into question, and seek depth and intensity in the way we engage with the world—something that often ends up irritating everyone around us.
And living well in a world that colludes against life is hard work. And that is what makes writing poems hard—not the writing itself but the conditions I am trying to write within.
My people (Bakongo) are known to be the witches and wizards of Angola, the jokes make me smile, I´m from a lineage of people who deal with the spirit. And it makes me glad because Jaliya is a celebration of spirit and magic.
My people (Bakongo) are known to be the witches and wizards of Angola, the jokes make me smile, I´m from a lineage of people who deal with the spirit. And it makes me glad because Jaliya is a celebration of spirit and magic.
