Preview #8, Journal of Pan African Studies, Poetry Issue
Guest Editor, Marvin X
Anthony Mays, South Korea
OBAMA
Articulate, dreamy, foreign child
The classic mulatto, infectious smile
Malcolm and Martin rolled into one
Mandingo’s scrapping bastard son!
Obama!
Styled his Gullah wife in a corporate blouse
Did a buck dance for bankers to the White House
Bailed out greedy bankers with a juicy treat
Did a Negro’s tap dance for Wall Street.
Obama!
Denounced his father, forsook with his preacher,
Praises robber barons and his Harvard teacher*
A tragic mulatto with blemished past
Wasn’t the first and won’t be the last!
Obama!
“Change” he preached - for “Change” people wait
More bailouts, tax and police state!
More of the same but in black face,
Just another national disgrace!
Obama!
Rescued the gangsters in private planes
While the jobless and homeless felt the pains
Silly voters he never meant to serve!
He’s the house Negro for the Federal Reserve.
Obama!
Ward Connally would say “amen!”
Stepin Fechet would call his act a sin!
A perfect puppet to deceive and pretend!
Obama!
Begs a bailout with tin cup in hand
Around his neck, a golden band
Dislikes elephants, but claims the donkey,
Begging like the organ grinder’s monkey!
Obama!
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l Barack Obama’s instructor in university was none other than Zbigniew Brzezinski, globalist, Trilateral Commisssion, Council of Foreign Relations, etc.
--Anthony Mays
I'm presently living in Korea for the past twelve years, my "soul on ice," as Cleaver wrote. I've read your poetry and was inspired by it, along with the writings of previous masters like Aime Ceasaire, Damas, Claude McKay, Baraka, Frances W. Harper, etc., etc.... God willing, I hope to shake your hand, Marvin X, before I surrender the ghost.
Felix Orisewike Sylvanus, Lagos, Nigeria
Farewell… to Lagos
Mother,
Leaving assumes the hope
This night is too long
I do not know when the sun will rise
But the sea breeze, the sea breeze being so
Friendly came to tell me always to stay a few day
I have to rush to the top hill
Do not mind the heavy night
I have torchlight I can trace my dream
If moon too refuses to come
The drum is rolling already, the drum
That dance tomorrow around is rolling already
I have to rush there and pick my part
Do not say I should stay till dawn; dawn
Cannot come rain has covered the heaven
O’ home, give me no pet; not this time
I will be happy without you
Father,
I’m glad I would never part a tear
No time for tear either
My feet is out there waiting for the journey
O’ brother – sister, friend of my green day
None knew you but to love you
--Felix Orisewike Sylvanus
I am Felix Orisewike Sylvanus by name. I live in Lagos, Nigeria where I’m currently running a degree programme in English language. I was born in Akure, Ondo State of Nigeria in 1982 I have written two anthology of poetry awaiting publication. I also write in other genres of literature.
Kamaria Muntu , United Kingdom
Life Expectancy
for Abdul
Daryl Grigsby's question: is 55 old age for a Black man?
Start with thisthere are no fritters on the burner
there will never be smells
ripe and holy as Sunday morning
corn muffins, kidney stew, tomato slices
on a Mingus morning
there will never be you on the porch
a fly brush of early red sun against your locs
the rustle of crisp newspapers
quicksilver like an Eagle’s span of wings
as you pause to peer through an October sky
just a grinnin
you should not have come back
you said it yourself
there was still the itch of soda lake
beneath the thin cloth of your shirt
in your sweat
you missed the coffee trees and waterfalls
the wetlands and the women
you were no romantic though
said you often heard the booming blue wail
days, nights, years of a people’s torture
riding the Pangani coast
ghost children in the salt pans
blood curdling on cliffs
fringing palms and waterbirds
still you missed Tanzania
you had found a place there
some peace
there will never be a memory
like a snapped cord
that says I could have been with you then
me with my small babies
and younger than you
my own impossible struggles and plans
could have been the cigarettes you smoked
or some dream flamed to ashes
black man you were trying so hard
only wanting a little kindness in your life
a house of certain meal and brick
cashmere horns in the midnight hour
at 45 your legs wobbled
and yellow diamonds shattered to dust
underneath black and white keys
that ushered in your last call
again the heart not outdistancing the heart
the medicine beyond the grasp
the elder women gathering to bury another son
and I don’t know if I could have turned your pain
into something we could have lived with
because there was one more call
and then no more
and when I heard
some part of life slipped dark and heavy from my soul
start with this
there is comfort in the way of things
hiccups of breath then quiet then breath again
Abdul, you are in the marketplace
you are wind and color
dancing with the women of Mulala
Women of Mulala: Tanzanian market women
Kamaria Muntu is an African-American Mother, Poet and Writer with extensive experience as a political organizer throughout the Southern United States. Her writing experience includes plays, essays, press releases, research reports and grants. Her activist experience focuses Black liberation and human rights. She recently founded her own production company; Rightimb films. Muntu currently resides in the United Kingdom.
L. E. Scott, Aotearoa/New Zealand
GOING TO THE VILLAGE
My brother
Nobody speaks of you
You sleep now in earth dust
A mound covering you
With no earthly name
You left the city
To hide your death in the forest
Even the witch-doctor
Will not harvest your bones
Village women wailing of your death
From across the road
Fearing what could escape from your death hole
Songs of sorrow hide in fear
Of your return from the city
My brother
Nobody speaks of you
Your death has turned love upside down
No animals will be sacrificed
For your journey home
Your father’s door has been marked
With signs of witchcraft
There is talk of burning fire with fire
Even in death
Fear makes you unsafe
The villagers are gathering stones
Not to mark your grave
It is not safe here for you
They say your death
Is as a thief at night
Coming among them in their beds
My brother
Nobody bathed you in death
They feared the wetness of you
Those who gathered
Came only to bury you
Their silence like your death
We have been shameful
And even now
We cannot speak your name
My brother
Forgive us for our fear and ignorance
In time
Your name will be spoken
My brother
On AIDS Day
The world will hear your name
--L. E. Scott
L. E. Scott is an African American jazz poet, currently based in
Aotearoa/New Zealand. He is on the staff of "Tu Mai", a magazine for the
indigenous people of Aotearoa/New Zealand. Scott has had a number of
books published, the latest being a collection of poems entitled "Bones",
published by Five Islands Press of Melbourne University, Australia. He
has also had work published in two recent anthologies, "Fingernails Across
The Chalkboard" and "Gwendolyn Brooks and Working Writers", both published
by Third World Press.
Chinwe Enemchukwu, Florida USA
Diasporans
Sizzling like whistling kettles
Running out of steam,
Despite the heightened heat
from the stoked fire beneath.
Fire stoked daily by bad winds
Hurling from the homeland.
Deadly winds, brutal as the harmattan
Fanning the fire and scorching the skin
of diasporans already double stretched thin.
The whistle, now a mournful whine
Emitting from once courageous souls
Weary from encompassing hopelessness,
Warding off hardship in the host land,
Terrified by surrounding wickedness.
Saddened by frequent untimely passing.
Plain finding it ever harder to stand
The whirlwind life of foreign lands.
Still they struggle to increase the pace,
Trying much harder to transform the race,
Straining daily to get it in stride,
And by so doing, surely control the tide,
And with that success, make it to shore,
From all indications, having tried for sure.
They beat themselves to messy pulp
Taking more than possible in a gulp.
They whistle and sizzle wildly, blowing
Twirling steam in an urgent puff,
Scorching white puff, nothing more.
Like whistling kettles working ever so hard
To give more steam, scorching steam, words
Useless for the problem on hand
But ever so harmful nonetheless.
--Chinwe Enemchukwu
Chinwe Enemchukwu is a pharmacist by profession, and a mother of six adult children. I am a Nigerian immigrant and have lived in the United States, by way of Florida, for over thirty years. I count myself as part of the Nigerian and Igbo Diaspora and participate in numerous activities involving these groups. My poems reflect on the current socio-economic and political situation in Nigeria.
Mabel Mnensa, South Africa
Mamlambo’s Helping Hand
Deep down
at the bottom of the motherland
it rolls out its hand
and says devil I be
rolls out the woman I should be,
canned and proud.
Rips out my heart that dare protest
the arms, legs that dare contest
what remains of me
is little grains so close to the sea
build into female perfect humility.
A big vast emptiness
where my heart once was
I try to find the answer to my sores
but the great Mamlambo roars over my calls
and sings
“hush little one now gone are your flaws
now we can find you a man
to feel up all your holes”.
--Mabel Mnensa
I am interested in the inherent power that poetry, especially performance poetry, has. My Masters dissertation, Speaking Out: African Orality and Post-Colonial Preoccupations in Selected Examples of Contemporary Performance Poetry examines the common preoccupations that emerge in South African and American poetry. Sarah Jones and Gil Scott-Heron were among the American poets whose work I explored in the paper that I completed last year.
Submissions accepted until October 15. Send to: jmarvinx@yahoo.com, include brief bio and pic. MS Word attachment
