BO MASEKELA

(for Hugh Ramopolo Masekela)

Great elephant of the Serengeti
Wielding tusk of burnished brass
Shimmering
Like the burning sands of Kalahari
Belching enharmonic bullets in
Staccato
Bursts of flugel-fire
Tom-tom
Talking drum
Djembe
Mali to Malawi
Ghana
Guinea
Liberia
Nigeria
Botswana
Lesotho
Senegal to Azania
Cut spiritual swathe
Cleared aural path
Through Colonial man
And Apartheid
With Mama Africa
Or Fela
Sometimes at his side
Hurled curses and music-missiles
At the coal mines
And the coal train called
And conjured from a cowbell
With a cry of “Stimela!”
Smoke
Hot muzzle of a flugel
Mixing
Blending
Harmony
Melody
Rhythm
In a smoke filled
She-been in Soweto
Voice of Shango
Thundering
Roar and shriek
Of revolution
Mellowing
To love ballad
Torrid
Yet sweet and sensual as strawberries
Courting
Cajoling
Seducing
Fela’s Lady
That early piece of brass
Golden gift from Satchmo
To the boy elephant
On a mission
In a Mission
In Johannesburg
Was worth one million times more
Than its weight in ivory
The Black Man
Black treasure
Master
Legend
Living
Kicking
Stomping
Huffing and a-puffing
Shrieking
Choo-choo
Like a coal train across the Transvaal
Colossal
As the hills of Kilimanjaro
Mighty
As the waters of the Zambezi
Was there with Sly and Jimi
Miles
Marley
Freddie
Miriam gone but Moses
Musical Moses
My Music Mecca
Ramopolo
Still here
Living
Kicking
Stomping
Huffing and a-puffing
Shrieking
Choo-choo
Like a coal train across the Transvaal

Copyright ©2012 by G. Newton V. Chance

RICE

(From the lagoons of Rangoon,
shone one million little moons)

I

Scattered to four corners.
Fruitful, bridal, exponential winds
Of multiplication,

Gospel of nutrition.
Every religion,
Every household,
Every land.

Rice, salt of bitter earth,
Blessed among victuals,
Oh cereal,
Infinite as the sand.

II

Removed from brown,
Strong exterior.
Refined to almost lifeless,
White interior.

Bleached bland,
Bleached red and black
From skin
Like Michael minus melanin.

Still gave sustenance to peasants,
Every two days, one tin per pot
In the killing fields of Pol Pot.

III

Apotropaic little grass seed
Mathematic little glass bead
Protecting families from famine
As the granaries of Egypt once did.

Green miracle
Of arithmomania, protecting,
Still protecting,

From salt-phobic soucouyant
And mirrorless soul
Of sesame-counting vampire.

©2011 by G. Newton V. Chance

COUNTING CANDLES

Here but for a while...
We are here but fo r a while.

One candle, two candle...
Lighting candles.

Every day, a new day,
Every day, a day older,
Every day, a day nearer.

One candle, two candle, three candle...
Lighting candles, blowing candles.

Every year, a new year,
Every year, a year older,
Every year, a year nearer.

Here but for a while...
We are here but for a while.

One candle, two candle, three candle, four candle...
Lighting candles, blowing candles, counting candles.

Here but for a while...
We are here but for a while.

Every day, a new day,
Every day, a day older,
Every day, a day nearer.

One candle, two candle, three candle...
Lighting candles, blowing candles, counting candles.

Here but for a while...
We are here but for a while.

Every year, a new year,
Every year, a year older,
Every year, a year nearer.

One candle, two candle, three candle...
Blowing candles, lighting candles, counting candles.

Here but for a while...
We are here but for a while.

Every day, a new day,
Every day, a day older,
Every day, a day nearer.

One candle, two candle...
Counting candles...

Flickering in the wind...
Candles flickering in the wind.

Here but for a while...
We are here but for a while...

© 2012 by G Newton V Chance

POISONED ZABOCAS

Rather than surrender to the cycle,
life's perpetual seesaw
of birth, rebirth and death,
a nation swooned and fell upon its word.
The white and wizened wraith of year-end yearnings
doodled broken études of regret.

Decapitated dreams, like chicken heads,
flutter in the dust of left behind.
Tukuma yampi eyes are slowly opening,
the sloth slowly awakens from its sleep
to poisoned zabocas upon the tree;
to Janus blurring boundaries

(of a new integrity).

© 2012 G Newton V Chance