Abeng #DubPoetry : Kwayana's Meditation (The Wisdom of The Drum)

 Kwayana's Meditation (The Wisdom of The Drum)

Greetings Bredren and Sistren; Idren and Idren. Big up and Bless up.

This dub poem Kwayana's Meditation, is actually a tribute and ode to Baba Eusi Kwayana and the Working Peoples' Association (WPA).

PablOGtee · KWAYANA'S MEDITATION (The Wisdom of the Drum) by Kaya Omodele #DubPoetry #reggaepoetry #dubpoem

Abeng Update: Kaya Omodele's Debut Cries of Redemption

Greetings Abeng and My Conscious Pen readers!
As you may done know already, Cries of Redemption is available in paper back on Amazon and ebook on Kindle. I have been getting great reviews but more importantly, readers genuinely love the positive vibes in this, my debut. As I stated before Cries of Redemption is wonderful combination of riveting short stories, heart-felt poetry, and informative and thought-provoking commentary. It is strapped with culture and history and positive reasoning, and rich in dialect and philosophy.


You can order or read a free preview here (Click Book Image)

Cries of Redemption will also soon be offered on other platforms like Smashwords and Book Baby.

The Abeng Presents: Cries of Redemption



Cries of Redemption: Songs of Life
.@The Abeng #abeng #literature

Re•demp•tion

:the act, process, or an instance of redeeming

Re•deem

transitive verb

2: to free from what distresses or harms: such as

  a: to free from captivity by payment of ransom



  b : to extricate from or help to

overcome something detrimental

  c: to release from blame or debt :clear

  d :to free from the consequences of sin

3: to change for the better : reform

4: repair, restore

My Little Sister commanded this book be created. She damn near demanded I compile Cries of Redemption from some of my writings she'd read. She's always twirling me 'round her little finger, so you know she got her way - as a big brother, ain't too much I denying my Baby Sis.

So, even though Cries of Redemption wasn't supposed to be my debut, here it comes. It's a variety book: story and rhyme (prose and poetry), joy and pain, sensible and little bit schupidy (jokey or playful).
But I'm sharing my reflections on them pages. Even when the stories are not about me, they're my perceptions, still. I'm a writer because I want my voice, no I need my voice to be heard. This is why I write. And like Steve Biko, I Write What I Like!
Jah Bless
K. Omodele
Cries of Redemption, coming November, on Amazon.

UPDATE: Cries of Redemption is Now Available on Amazon

Caribbean Poet Cicely A. Rodway's Worlds Away From Home

Worlds Away From Home (from her book Sunstreams and Sunsets)

by Cicely A. Rodway

Looking out at snow-capped trees

in the heart of Queens, Jamaica,

worlds away from home

yet home

the heartmind trembles,

rails at the ceilings

lowered by the

for whom the Lady's torch

does not shine bright.

In the heart of Jamaica

worlds away from home,

glimpses of possibilities

sporting chances

level fields

equal odds

dreams of undeferred dreams

fuel the need to challenge

the rigid ceilings

erected for the hounded

lowered on the shadowed

the old new prey

crouched

cramped

manacled

confined by carefully erected

low ceilings

in this new world

where the Lady's lamp shines

shines brightly

only on the chosen.

Cicely A. Rodway, Ed. D, LCSW, CASAC, is a retired English Professor of the Percy E. Sutton SEEK Program at Queens College, CUNY (City University of New York). Currently she functions in two roles: Coordinator of the SEEK Program's Academic Learning Center and the Coordinator of Vocational and Higher Education at HANDS ON Health Associates, an outpatient clinic for people in recovery in East New York, Brooklyn. A daughter of the Caribbean, she was born in St. Lucia, West Indies, and grew up in Guyana.

Sunstreams and Sunsets was published by African World Press, Inc.

Longing for, More

"I was cold and I danced to keep warm."~ Josephine Baker

"Ms. Josephine-" Kaya Omodele replies, "this is why I write."

Suffered a thousand deaths!
caged in an eight-by-ten
a bull in a pen
pacing steps, grunting
confined in concreted spaces
designed to
gut spirit from ribs
and plastic wrap thoughts
in stifling loneliness.

When Lonely oozes through
these cinderblocks
and tussles with my dreams
sucking warmth from conscience;
your photos spark the darkness
with so much soul-rousing light,
your taste lingers, sweet,
like tongue kissing time.

Though you're not here in my arms tonight
your memory I hug tight
I'm so longing for-
sssshhhhhhh-
a hint of your scent
in that Egyptian-cotton, white sundress
wispy whispers, "Yes,"
breathless
essence
of you.

CARIBBEAN POETRY: If We Must Die by Claude McKay (Jamaican Poet and Novelist of The Harlem Renaissance)

If We Must Die

by Claude McKay

Strange Fruit

If we must die - let it not be like hogs
Hunted and penned in an inglorious spot,
While round us bark the mad and hungry dogs,
Making their mock at our accursed lot.
If we must die - oh, let us nobly die,
So that our precious blood may not be shed
In vain; then even the monsters we defy
Shall be constrained to honor us though dead!
Oh, Kinsmen! We must meet the the common foe;
Though far outnumbered, let us show us brave,
And for their thousand blows deal one death-blow!
What though before us lies the open grave?
Like men we'll face the murderous, cowardly pack,
Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back!

More about Claude McKay

Jamaican Claude McKay: Writer of the Harlem Renaissance

Caribbean Writer Claude McKay: Poet Laureate of the Harlem Renaissance

by Kaya Omodele @TheAbeng

Writer Claude McKay was a pre-eminent poet and novelist of the Harlem Renaissance. His experiences coming up in Colonial Jamaica in the late 1800's to the early 1900's heavily influenced McKay's writing; and his encounters with racism in America affected him deeply, just check out his defiance in "If We Must Die", one of my all-time favorite poems.

Claude McKay was born to farmers in the Jamaican countryside in 1889. In 1912 he published two books: Songs of Jamaica and Constab Ballads; both are volumes of poetry written in patois (Jamaican dialect patwa) and reflected McKay's belief in the resilience, self-sufficiency and strong community values shared by people of his rural Jamaica.

Claude McKay Comes to Harlem
Although migrated from Jamaica to the United States in 1912 to study agriculture at Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, by 1914, he had move north to Harlem, like tens of thousands of African-Americans from the South, and immediately began writing poetry again. In 1919, he wrote the sonnet "If We Must Die"- a call to arms for African Americans to stand up to the violence being unleashed on blacks in that post World War I era. In that same year, Claude McKay became contributor and editor at The Liberator magazine.

McKay in Europe (Turns to Communism)
McKay grew angry , rebellious and increasingly more radical in his views against the oppression of blacks.  He attended the  Fourth Congress of The Third Communist International in Moscow in  1922 and by 1923 was living in Western Europe and Tangiers. But soon, he grew disillusioned by, and then became critical of, American, British and Soviet communists. By the 1930's, he abandoned communism altogether. In his vocal criticism of international communism, he never wavered in his championing of the cause of working-class blacks and never stopped bigging up the need for community development. By 1934 McKay was back in Harlem, USA, where he continued to write and publish.
The Claude McKay died in Chicago in 1948.

On June 2, 2016, in a proclamation that June had been declared National Caribbean-American Heritage Month, President Barack Obama stated "...the legacy of Caribbean Americans is one of tenacity and drive... and by carrying out Jamaican-American poet Claude McKay's call to 'strive on to gain the height/ although it may not be in sight', we can enable more young people, at home and in the Caribbean, to reach for the change that is within their grasp."*

* The Weekly Star (June 9-15, 2016 North American Ed., p.19): June Declared National Caribbean-American Heritage Month

Sources
Cooper, Wayne F.. Claude McKay: Rebel Sojourner in the Harlem Renaissance: A Biography. Baton Rouge, LA, 1987

Claude McKay's Works

Poetry
Songs of Jamaica (1912)
Constab Ballads (1912)
Spring in New Hampshire and Other Poems (1920)
Harlem Shadows (1922)

Novels
Home to Harlem (1928)
Banjo (1929)
Banana Bottom (1933)

Collections of Short Stories
Gingertown (1932)

Memoir
A Long Way from Home (1937)

Collection of Essays
Harlem, Negro Metropolis (1940)

Abeng Urban Poetry: Redemption Cry (Reflections of A Fallen Soul)

                         Cry My Redemption (Reflections of A Fallen Soul)

                                      copyright 2016 K. Omodele

Ever wonder what point a heart hardens and drops?

Vulnerability buried in emotional plots

At fourteen years old began to lose control

when booze-infused rage batter-bruised my soul

Glass shattered, bond severed, head bloodied by shards

Plus my arms were too short to box with God,

So I mentally laced up; mind squared, face upped

"Never weak again!" Then streets called, raced up

Toed the ledge of the abyss watching life unfold

Mama asked me 'bout my scars I left my Truth untold

Images too raw, memories water boarded m'soul

swallowed whole; Internalized, turned cold -like snake

Shed skin, re-emerged. Don't blink! Don't feel!

Veins buzzing current, nerves hard-wired steel

Wounds heal, but dreams shrivel like raisins 'gainst sun

Innocence suffered and drowned when soaked in rum.

Hook (Chorus):

Vulnerability ridded, heart hollowed out, pitted

I got notches in my skin that mark the day of my descent

Certain crimes I've committed, penitentiary fitted

I carve verses bleeding penance, shedding tears of my redemption.

Vulnerability ridded, heart hollowed out, pitted

These notches in my skin mark my day of descent

Certain crimes I've committed, penitentiary fitted

I put my pen to this paper and I cry my redemption.

NO FAIRY-TALE VALENTINES (A Sonnet for a Queen)

                        Abeng Poetry: No Fairy-Tale Valentines (A Sonnet for a Queen)

                                             copyright K. Omodele 2016

For The Empress:

I do not celebrate Saint Valentine

I know December Twenty-Fifth's untrue

Laugh to the floor at mythic fairy tales

But envision dancing 'mongst stars with you.

Won't fool our child about no Easter eggs

Saint Nick with reindeer and sleigh 'pon roof

If he asks me have I known miracles

Tell him Jah gifted me him and you.

Queen-mother you rode rough roads with your King

Determined hearts conquer walls, that's true.

When he questions us 'bout divinity

We'll pull him tight, wrap my arms around you.

No masquerade ball, no Valentine themes,
I'll three-step* whole night my child and my Queen.

* a type of waltz to soul music

Abeng Poetry: Pounds of Black Ice (Urban Poetry)

               Urban #Poetry: Pounds of Black Ice (Justice Can't Breathe)

                                 Copyright  K. Omodele 2015

"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter." ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

You stop us; frisk us

with yuh Giuliani justus*

You sweat us; no let up,

Now it's ninety-six degrees

You go me swingin' on a noose

in this Home of the Freeze

Strung up in a tree

It's so hard to breathe.

You got me 'gainst a wall

moving slower than Diallo

reachin' for I.D.

Your gun hand tremblin' like leaves

yuh fingers twitchin' up to squeeze

tension tighter than a sneeze

You want me down on my knees-

strange fruit me up in trees?

Fifty lead-starred shells

hammered young Sean Bell

pounded promises of life

from his never-will-be-wife.

Black Life? Candle flames

flickerin' in Chi-town** winds;

flutterin' blades of grass

driven by the breeze.

So tread light, Trayvons!

Noose tight! My fight?

Those iron tones and shifty vibes

Garner-ed behind officers' hooded eyes.

I hear the CRACKing of yuh whip

in gavel CLACKS and cuff CLICKS

Mass incarceration slick; three TICKS-

TOCK. Lives stocked behind a fence.

You say, "Justice is blind." Right!

The dirty slut couldn't see?

Charleston BLAMMED down to his knees?

Rice Mama soaked in tears of grief?

In Staten Isle I can't breathe

Oh Eleven London banged up

Oh Twelve Linden pushed her hands up

Now, Cleveland stand up? Slut can't you see?

Chocolate cities screamin'

Baltimore burnin'

Same song 'round the world

Same turntable*** turning-

spinning sounds of strife,

how a pounded Black life

is worth so much more than pounds of black ice.****

In this world of ruby sunsets, can you believe?

Justus got me on a noose, it's so hard to breathe.

* justice for some; justice for a selected few

** Chicago

*** record player

**** black ice - black diamonds

WRITING IS CATHARTIC

"#Writing is cathartic; it is a cleanser of the conscience, it is sanative to the soul." ~Kaya Omodele

http://consciouspen.blogspot.com/2010/12/catharsis-when-i-write.html

http://consciouspen.blogspot.com/2015/01/caribbean-poetry-ca-thar-sis-ii.html#VoF22LYrlkq

CARIBBEAN POETRY: Broken Trust a Haiku

copyright 2016 K. Omodele

Broken trust's a burst -

'way kite; heart string snapped, dropping,

flopped from breathless heights.

#haiku #poetry

Renaissance Man: Blessed Earthday, Ivor Edson Brown

 Blessed Earthstrong, Ivor

By K. Omodele @theabeng

"Don't judge the man you see before you by those you seen before!" ~ I.E. Brown, The Love Ethic

Today is my cousin Ivor Edson Brown's Earthday, which means it's the anniversary of the day he drew his first breath on Earth.

I mentioned before, on this blog, our final reasoning over the phone, talking clear 'cross the Pond. I could tell you how, in our catching up with each other's life, he listened tentatively and was compassionate when imparting his wisdom. I could share how we laughed, hard, 'til we belly nearly buss, at a Church Street memory- me, at seven and fresh off the plane from America, gripping a cricket bat over my shoulder like a baseball bat, waiting for my cousin to bowl me the ball.

I could tell you 'bout his mind- BRILLIANT; whenever we'd notice one another Online on FB, we would drop in and chat about history or economics or music, sometimes expound on something that caught his eye here in my posts. See, Cuzzo and me, we shared the Rodway passion for African history, culture and art. And, dissecting politricks.*

I could go on for days 'bout his gifts and talents; our tribe's creativity permeates his poetry and saturates his song, tapping form from hip-hop styles and melting tone from Windrush**/Caribbean themes. I could express what he means to us that knew him, those who came to love him. But here, you can see for yourself, read what people thought about my cousin http://www.iebrown.me/tributes/

Brixton Man

Born in London to a Jamaican father and St. Lucian mother, Ivor also spent years in Georgetown and Vieux-Fort; so, Ivor is truly a Son of the Caribbean. Like the Caribbean sun, he shines passion-hot and flows with his convictions.

I heard, somewhere, that a man's true wealth isn't measured by the amount of possessions he's acquired in life, but by the amount of lives he's touched. Then Ivor, Man, I hope you know how we feel about you.

Remembering Ivor Edson Brown  www.iebrown.me

"For if you always think of me, I will have never gone."

Never Gone! Never Forgotten!

One Love, Cuz...

                

Ivor's #CaribbeanPoetry

                 Amongst The Architecture

                 copyright Ivor Edson Brown

Let's blaze it up in the name of those that death became

and those who name loved ones amongst the slain.

Aggression is almost instinctive in the city where the blitz* hit,

estates dominate the landscape of every district.

Where men love to boast about crime, bait theyselves up,

Police had done spy them from a mile.

Now, which one of these stooges can come test my heights?

We're fire and ice, like logic and the fool's advice.

My Garveyite foresight, reveals to me what fools see in hindsight.

Looking beyond the hype, price tags and bright lights,

beyond all-a-dat drawing knife and gun fights,

beyond the stereotypes that plague the inner city.

The ignorance only serves to make the crisis worse,

the devil's ways infiltrate even the wisest church.

Me and my people deal with life science, year to year

and still stay shitty and pissy like estate** stairs, for real.

I drink with Africans straight from the continent

and live amongst immigrants in my estate tenement.

Speaking with my pen again, I think in black ink.

Sisters, youths and grown men again, come we make the link.

I wrote this, hoping you will quote this to one another,

take it with you as you travel through this concrete Gomorrah.

In a left hand drive with Dutch plates, my brandy spills,

bunin' lean-up on the right, sliding down Brixton Hill.

Watching the fatherless play crime games in the early hours,

Getting their name mentioned, screw face, sour.

Over estimating power, under estimating their potential,

75% of black youth leave school with no credentials.

Coming off their estates calling that ghetto,

'cause there's coppers on the outside and guns in the middle.

False prophets say the working on it, speaking in riddles,

the average age of killers dropping north and south of the river.

Equipped to kill and contemplating murder, that's a child, lord.

Fools drift to sleep and slide off.

Pseudo Afrocentric baby mothers and fathers clashing,

gwan neglect your seed, I guarantee your revolution ain't gonna happen.

That's the legacy from the black holocaust years.

I urinate on architecture built on the proceeds of slave trade.

Look into yourself for answers.

You better have a plan for your child 'cause the system's

got plans for us.

copyright I.E. Brown

Read more of Ivor's Writing    
http://www.iebrown.me/ivors-writing/

Prophets Vexed (A Sonnet)

Caribbean Poetry: Prophets Vexed (A Sonnet)

Abeng Caribbean Poetry: Prophets Vexed (A Sonnet)

copyright 2015 K. Omodele

"The price of hating other human beings is loving oneself less."

~ Eldridge Cleaver, Soul On Ice

The Prophets of Paths shudder at voices bawling

from blood-boiled rage unleashed 'pon innocents' shoulders.

In this Reign of Techs compassion's tumbled and fallen

like boots kicked off feet of war-disgusted soldiers.

Prophets shake heads as zealots hurl stones at caskets

Misspoken parables prop up houses 'pon sand

"Knowledge without wisdom is water carried in baskets.

Jah Word shall spread thru bloodshed, with sword in-hand."

Prophets vexed cringe; proverbs bent into gun rhetoric

Trumpeted Truths, now off-key, rankled-ranted sound

slanted words echoed. Bodies bucked, bullets bellowed

Humanity butchered, understanding drowned.

Bare Innocents killed

Ey, Wicked, be still!

Dub Poetry: Kwayana's Meditation (Wisdom of the Drum)

Abeng Dub Poetry: Kwayana's Meditation
(The Wisdom of The Drum)
     
copyright 2015 K. Omodele  @TheAbeng

"The Caribbean tradition, taken as a whole, is a revolutionary tradition. It is the stage on which acted Cudjoe and Cuffy, Accabreh and Accra, Toussaint, Quamina and Damon, Adoe and Araby."* ~ Sidney King (Eusi Kwayana)

Eusi Kwayana #FreedomFighter

Intro:  
Yow! Dis meditation/Moves di nation/
            ReVERBERATION...VERBeration

I feel de drum-min' of yuh words,
rub-a-dubbin' of yuh verbs,
yuh meditation is kinetic-
medication of de herb
levitates me like a bird-
yuh rebel riddim moves me
depose a titled king, go
liberate like Baba Eusi.
Asante rise up outta shanty,
proverbs, Broddah Anansi**,
yearnin' for Kumasi***
Cuffy burn down half a Canje
Uncle Brian scribed we picture,
painted scripture, sketched the sound.
Uncle Walter woke the people,
lit the city; Tell de town!

(Bridge:)
Yeah Man. Don't bother call dis no poetry/dis is kinetic flow-etry
Prophets are hardly recognized in their own lands
This rebelution forged by drum-ragin', fire-blazin' sound.

Seethin' like Accra buss 'e chain
want SParK field a-flame
Darke flicks-ing up the protest****
jukked an' gutted from de frame
pickney***** scatter down de lane
Boy, u bet-ter run
policeman ah come
wid bad-mind and gun.
But the soundin' of de gun
can't drown de wisdom of the drum
grind a fool down with a pestle
can't part de foolish from a dunce.
Kwayana's wisdom may taste bitter
cure de sick, move de lame
N'Daiye couldn't tame
cock she crown, lock she mane.

* Caribbean slave revolt/rebellion leaders. Quote from "Birth of Freedom," New World Magazine, Special Independence Issue, 1966
**Anansi, or Anancy, is a spider, a trickster character from African oral tradition, that was
brought over by slaves to the West Indies/Caribbean and lives on in Caribbean
tradition and folk tales. (Akin to Brer Rabbit in the U.S. South)
***Kumasi is the chief city of the Asante/Ashanti, NW of Accra, Ghana
****Father Darke was a priest stabbed to death while photographing government
forces brutalizing anti-government protestors in Georgetown, Guyana
*****children

Abeng Caribbean Poetry: My Church Street Yard (Ode For Ivah)

My Church Street Yard (Ode to Ivah ~ Ivor Edson Brown)

Copyright 2015 K. Omodele

A black-thorn rose in meh Church Street yarden.
Smiles bloom there once, then ruff winds hardened.
Wish time would roll back so
I'd mek my old yard know
It's the one place in the whole, wide world I go
when my days darken.
I got meh Church Street yard, now
fold-up in my heart, though
-ripped, torn and broken.

For my cousin- a man named Ivor.

In 'membrance of our final reasoning 'pon de phone,
gyaffin' clear 'cross de Pond:




"One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the
darkness conscious."~ Carl Jung

Rest now, my blood.
One Love,
K. Omodele

Abeng Caribbean Poetry #caribbeanpoetry

ABENG CARIBBEAN POETRY: CALYPSO (in TENNESSEE)

Caribbean Poetry: Calypso (in Tennessee)

       copyright 2014 K. Omodele

 



So, they're footin' it, side by side, shiverin'

'cross this Chat Town bridge with

pinkened lights, above, mellowing the

late-October dusk.

When they stop, toe the rail

overlookin' a docked-

grounded riverboat hotel,

she whispers, "It 'pose to be possessed; y'know, like haunted."

Then in her smile's incandescent wake the runnin' river shimmers

and the whole surroundin', suffocatin' city lights.

Then when she clutches his arm and

enwraps nippy fingers with hers,

it's like love-cravin' legs, like thighs,

her ankles encircling his back,

drawin' him in close, urgin'

"I'm try'na leave. Nex' time you go home,

PLEASE, take me with you!"

And this is the moment she begins, finally,

easing through his board and zinc fence.

Slips in, slow-ly, inching her way in

for the first time- she, spirited songbird

coos down his soul, entwines their thoughts,

titillates dreams, massages his need

to be needed; caressing wanting.

"Ain't no rush," he'd told her a while before

but both now realise she can masquerade no more

her lingering itch- her longing for

stimulating moments brimming over with Being

followed by endless wide-eyed

world-wide, whirl-wind tomorrows.

Now, face to face, their breathing flutters

hummingbirds suspended

       mid-air

her excitement building,

hovers-anticipating

long, deep-strokin', Rapture-floodin'-a

moon-soaked beach-in-a-hammock-under-

his-palm-tree nights...

             WHEW!

Temperature risin' now, beats throbbin' hot

Rubbin her up- this tropical riddim

tweakin' her treble, reverbin' her bass

pumpkin pumpin', pulsatin' her sumthin'

gradually sweetin', she- ripenin' papaw-

Tempo increasin', gatherin', growin'

now hurricane surgin'

'pon Carnival steel, pulse

pan, pangin'; pannin' and bangin'

slammin and rammin'

jammin' steamily

yearnin'. for. MORE:

BambooFireBurnin'DesireLifeLight

Stars Bright

Moonbeams SPARK

gush thru she heart

Now gallops settle and trot

trembles. sighs. still, now.

Eyes fill with wonder

mind graspin'

pantin'. gaspin'.

She breathless,

Kai so ca lypso

all up in she

Tennessee.

CARIBBEAN POETRY: Catharsis II: The Lost Writers' Colony

        CARIBBEAN POETRY:

Catharsis II: The Lost Writers' Colony

copyright 2014 K. Omodele

                                          

   

See that blood in their eyes?

red ink scripts their rage        

Them blood-fire hearts?

spit flames, scorch up page.

See them weapEns they holdin' like         

Shaka's altered spear?

pick Truth from scabbed wounds 'til

pus oozes, sores air.

Life's stumbles, flat falls?

bruise, etch, batik, stain,

write selves off them knees

dye canvasses rain.

They write 'cause minds barred-in must build in blocks,

Writing absolves scarred-up guilt in blocks,

Verbs purge, nouns foil, in cipher* guilds and flocks,

Stagnate in the box a dream wilts and rots.

They write characters smelted from building blocks

Granite Rocks molten, ethos smithed in hok

Weatherbeaten from storms, ships refuged in-docks

Paradox, they find peace weighin' sin in blocks.

Dormant time is unforgiving like jilted frocks

Themes and plots, narratives tilted clocks

Yielded Glocks, pens now wield in blocs,

Fury and sound settle like silt in lochs.

This is a wright-ers' clique/ with Sonny's Blues

Feelin' zoras and mckays/ kincaids and hughes.

* gathering of MC's, poets in a rap/spoken word session.

ABENG CARIBBEAN POETRY: Nefertiti's Egyptian-Cotton Sundress

  Nefertiti's White Egyptian-Cotton Sundress

  copyright 2013 K.Omodele

                 

 

Nefertiti never filled 

a white, Egyptian-cotton sundress

with s'much breath-taking grace and copper-toned form.

In that Egyptian-cotton white dress

her smile couldna swelled her King's heart so, like the noon sun

have him clutching her hand, tight so, up Georgia Avenue.

If her King coulda seen what this King here knew-

that vibrant, white sundress on radiant you,

he woulda traded all Egypt

that Georgia Ave. noon...