open-mic night at the afriart gallery..

-
Its a Friday and yours truly is on a bodaboda snaking through a traffic jam in the thick Kintante road.Im making my way to Lugogo showground where I think Afriart gallery is hosting an open-mic night which I was humbly told is going to ’happen’. .and happen it truly did, only at another venue.

I get to U M A showground and my Swahili is in; I ask the askari if there is anything happening at the gallery and he tells me nothing, and true to his word I can see the place isn’t lit up.

I insist on seeing for myself and at the front I meet a couple of other poetry lovers who have ‘bounced’ like me. A few phone calls later truly confirm that the event would not take place. ‘So what should we do?’ the ladies ask, and one says the rugby club is always jumping on Fridays; of course I know, my blood is saturated with that thing that we go hungrily there for..It’s just that I’m trying so badly to quit...

I had been pumping this little frame of mine with bitter since 4 pm and I thought I had had enough, enough forever... but that night promised me that I would never.

To cut the thoroughly long story short I had too much of pints and I don’t remember whoever I was with, plus I lost my priceless poetry album by Imani; whoever might have it...Pleeeeeeeeease...

To make it up to anyone who strictly believes that this is a poetry and arts blog and not someone’s memoir of teen-like drinking sprees ,I have prepared a collection of love pieces from as far as the 1700..and I screwed up on Friday, the apology chokes but I guess its audible enough..

TO THE LOVERS

I can’t imagine

I can’t imagine a day
Without your charming smile;
Nor can I justly convey
How much I love your style.

I can’t imagine a week
Without your warm embrace;
Nor the absence of your pleasing form
And lovely flawless face.

I can’t imagine a year
Without you near to share
The times that I do endear,
Or the moments of despair.

I can’t imagine a lifetime
Without you by my side;
For I want a love divine,
I need you as my guide.

I can’t imagine eternity
Without the love I’ve known.
My spirit would wander hopelessly
In agony-alone.



Feelings

Endlessly you inspire me
By what you say or do.
Thus, with great sincerity,
I’ll tell my feelings true.

You always use your eloquence
To raise my self esteem.
To help me boost my confidence
To realize a dream.

You comfort me in times of stress
You hold me tenderly
Your soothing words then do suppress
All of my anxiety.

You love me with a passionate grace
Which gives me ecstasy
And there within your warm embrace,
My spirit wonders free.

In mind and body, I do thrive
Within your loving sphere.
And easily do I survive
Each and every passing year

So now you know in words sincere,
My feelings pure and true,
They reaffirm what is clear
That I am so truthfully in love with you.



One of the most revered love letters of our times is this one from Napoleon Bonaparte to his then lover Josephine, it’s about how passionate a man thought to be obsessed with power and wars can be.
Read it; it will show you another part of the man.

Napoleon Bonaparte
To
Josephine de Beaueharnais
(Paris, December 1795)

I wake filled with thought of you. Your portrait and the intoxicating evening which we spent yesterday have left my senses in turmoil Sweet, incomparable Josephine, what a strange effect you have on my heart! Are you angry? Do I see you looking sad? Are you worried?...My soul aches with sorrow, and here can be no rest for your lover; but is there still more in store for me when, yielding to the profound feelings which overwhelm me, I draw from your lips, from your heart a love
Which consumes me with fire? Ah! It was last night that I fully realized how false an image of your portrait gives!

You are leaving at noon; I shall see you in three hours.
Until then, mio dolce amor, a thousand kisses; but give me none in return, for they set my blood on fire.

The course of love never did run smooth.
-Shakespeare

It’s difficult to know what moment love starts; it is less difficult to know that it has begun.
-Longfellow.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A UGANDAN CLASSIC by TIMOTHY WANGUSA.

-
This classic piece is one that you read and go like; ’enough said’ no word ought to be ejected or added to this masterpiece. I hope you enjoy it. Psalms 23 part II The state is my shepherd, I shall not want; it makes me to Lie down in a subsidized house It leads me to political tranquility; it restores my faith in a lucrative future. It leads me into paths of loans and pensions, For its international reputation’s sake. Yea, even though the valley of the shadow Of Kivvulu I will fear no Kondos; For the state is with me, its tanks and guns comfort me. It preserves for me a bank account, in the presence of devaluation; It fills my pockets with allowances, my salary overflows. Surely increments and promotion follow me all the days of my life; And I shall dwell in senior staff quarters forever.
Read more

letter from a contract worker - Antonio Jacinto

-
Image
Few poems have been written as raw and truthfully as this,well according to me,but this here is an African masterpiece.. I wanted to write you a letter my love, a letter that would tell of this desire to see you of this fear of losing you of this more than benevolence that i feel of this indefiable ill that pursues me of this yearning to which i live in total surrender I wanted to write you a letter my love, a letter of intimate secrets a letter of memories of you of you of your lips as red as henna of your hair as black as mud of your eyes as sweet as honey of your breasts as hard as wild orange of your lynx* gait and of your caresses such that i can find no better here I wanted to write you a letter my love, that would recall the days in our haunts our nights lost in the long grass that would recall the shade falling on us from the plum trees the moon filtering the endless palm trees that would recall the madness of our passion and the bitterness of our separation... I wanted to writ...
Read more

The Road To Eldoret - Tony Mochama

-
The scene from his hotel room screen in Nakuru still fills his mind. Let’s call him M. He’s from Muranga, he still drives the Datsun 120 Y that he bought in 1972 when he was a twenty two year old boy, and he’s got a family in the outskirts of Eldoret where his wife runs the family farm (cows and wheat) that he bought in 1982 from a white man fleeing the coup that “never happened,” as he is fond of saying. “So I got the farm cheap.” That was 1982. M was a sharp hustler from Muranga, now he’s grown into an old-ish respectable farmer, 57 years in age, a bit of a sage and a scrooge who in-spite of his Shs.3 million in cash in Equity Bank (savings, he takes no loans) still drives a Datsun 120 Y, and why, till last night, he had never stayed at a hotel! He did now, in the fiery first days of 2008, at a place called Midlands Hotel because he has heard that the land is no longer safe. There was a television set in the hotel room with one of those fancy new satellites that one finds everywhere ...
Read more