The Widower.

An ordinary full moon
Not a whisper of warning
No signs to alert me
Night came in stealth, so suddenly
As I lay here in sleep
Beside the keeper of my heart
And in her womb nestled my unborn seed
Night came at that pregnant hour
When dusk and dawn meet in embrace
And like a coward, it scurried away before I awoke
It left long before I could catch my breath
Night came empty-handed
And left with both hands full

And so when she died
The music died with her too
And as they put her down
Beneath the udala tree
I sank to my knees and cried
And mourned for the loss of two
Seasons have come, seasons have gone
And yet the keeper of my heart
Holds on to it still
I feel her breath fanning my skin
In the rustlings of the cassava leaves
She sings a lonely melody
With the lost creatures of the night
And once and again
She comes with the rain
And as the waters touch my lips
I weep, for I taste her salty tears
And on every night with a full moon
I go to sleep and pray
That tonight be the night
That night comes again in stealth, so suddenly
And finally takes me to the keeper of my heart.

© ‘Kego Onyido

Daughter Of Eve.

He first saw her under a silvery moon
And stood transfixed watching from afar
He mustered enough courage to call upon her
But only by the next noon
For she was fair as she was fine
With a pretty lone dimple and eyes that shine
With hidden dark mysteries of winter's night
And the warmth of summer's sunny delight
Height like an amazon, a figure defying age
The kind that drove boys wild and their girls to rage
She was Eve's daughter, and yet so shy
And like an angel, in innocence, she could fly.

She's enthralled by him and he tells her tales
Words of flattery so sweet she fails
To see the spear that would fiercely pierce
Her sweet nectar with razor-sharp speed
He had his fill and quenched a need
She had a bitter thrill and is left with his seed
And many moons after she welcomes her daughter
And whenever there's a silvery moonlight out in the sky
She holds her baby to her breasts and croons a haunting lullaby
Of a woman-child in the very beginning
Long, long ago before original sin
Who was fair as she was fine
With a pretty lone dimple and eyes that shine.........

© ‘Kego Onyido

A Journey Into Madness.

This descent to the abyss

Is not at all an unwelcome state

For my senses have never known peace such as this

It is but a fitting fate

For a mind drugged for ages with unhappiness

It did not come suddenly in a flash

My journey was like the welcomed approach of sleepiness

It came gently, gently, none too harsh

An exciting spiral through a dark tunnel

Like a pretty twister forming an earth’s funnel

With no beginning and no end

No surprising turn or bend

Just an eternity of free flying motion

With the whispering winds

Blowing away at the wings

Of my unsung sanity

I will stay here for a while

And journey on for a thousand and a mile

Until I forget all my nightmares

And the crippling fear disappears.

© ‘Kego Onyido

A Lost Immigrant's Prayer.

Across rivers and oceans,

Through clouds and skies,

We journeyed from the old world to the new,

The mystery before us, beckoned like a seductive sorceress.

And yet, even not knowing, we dared to embrace it still

We fled a land of hunger and despair and pain

We loosed the cobwebs of chains that held us in bondage

And wept with hope at the freedom of a new age

And slept with the painful memory

of how we were called efulefu.

And so we came, freeborn all

To begin as neither masters nor slaves.

Rather we start again as nothing.

We live day to day on graces,

Showered from the lands of our birth

We refuse to give up

We shall make a home here yet

A home for the little ones, yet unborn

We shall work the fields

And stand in line like robots

Yes, we shall be called only by numbers,

Remaining faceless and nameless.

We shall do these things

So that one day

Our children shall proudly bear our names

And none shall ever be called efulefu.

We shall teach them well, our children,

Of the old ways from where we fled

For we see now, the beauty

Clearly hidden in the grotesque shadows of the old world.

We fled diseases and now are plagued with diseased minds.

We fled poverty and now see the sins in plenty

Nothing is sacred, even old age is defiled

We see the lights everywhere

And the darkness that lurks a breath behind

We shall teach them well, our children

To marry the old worlds of soul with the new one of steel

And create something uniquely theirs

For only with this artistry can they conquer

And be kings of these new dynamic worlds emerging.

Remembering always the land from where we came

So that none shall ever be called efulefu.

The Devil Came To Church Today.

The Devil came to church today

And he had a lot of sweet things to say

We jumped for joy seeing him standing ahead

Tall and handsome in the fiery pulpit

With an arrogant knowing tilt to his head

He invoked upon us his sordid glory from hell’s pit

When the choir sang, he clapped his hands

And danced in ecstasy to the roaring bands

The congregation looked to him for salvation

And he preached his sublime message of damnation

He came prepared for a feast of our souls

And drenched us with unholy water from our heads to our soles

We were entranced by his seductive presence

And lifted our hands up to him to be filled with his essence

When we stood, he sat and when we sat, he stood

He’d come to freely give us our souls’ filling food.

He mesmerized us all

Children, women and men

And lured us in to take the final fall

And we all shouted loud choruses of ‘Amen’!

He beckoned to us to take that last step closer

And promised all our sufferings would soon be over

He would fill up our empty purses

With blessings we now know to be curses

Again and again, he smirked in victory

Reveling in our self inflicted misery

And just as we were about to bow our heads in surrender

That soft soothing voice of the redeemer

Whispered long-forgotten psalms of the father’s grace

Reminding us all of the eternal race

We were washed anew, free from shame

And sang in glory praising the name above all names

And so we laughed out in scorn at lying Lucifer

And took back our salvation and our crown

And we all wept with joy and sang out ‘Alleluia’!

The devil came to our little church, at the outskirts of town.

© ‘Kego Onyido