Young,
I have lived this life with half smiles
full frowns and numb fingers.
I have imagined dragons and flown on backs
Of fairies every time I put tooth under pillow.
Those nights were full of colour
Makes me want to be child again.
To run around naked,
Tempting the cold weather to send flu
Being begged to finish food
And to be tucked to dreams when night creeps.
I long to cry uncontrollably.
Irritatingly loud Without shame
But with fear of mother’s beatings
Knowing too well,
She’ll wipe your tears
And warm you food right after you thought
She’d kill you
but she didn’t.
What she never said is that life kills
S
l
o
w.
As I stand here,
I am a thousand shades of lonely.
I walk with the burden of being adult
In a world where your freedom is
Restricted by each year lived.
Your quest is nothing but a fading reality!
Took me long enough to know
That these bones will crack and this flesh
Will birth to life creatures when I’m one
With the earth.
As the wind carries particles of soil,
know
You are dust,
When
Sunrise is no longer art
You are dust,
when
Sunset is no longer beauty
You are dust
When
each breath taken invites Death!
So I will walk towards the end
find a sweeter world within the
Corners of a coffin
And lay, still, undisturbed
At least I will find father there!
He left to be dust in a world only known
To the long sleepers.
When child,
I wish I’d ask the secrets to life
Instead of crying for toys and dolls,
I wish I’d ask why he married two wives
And if it’s okay if I did the same.
I wish I’d asked why
I shouldn’t marry a Kikuyu woman,
Beautiful as they come.
God knows,
How many hearts I’ve broken.
God knows,
I know pain more than I know self.
Then they say, it will be okay,
You agree on the outside!
It seems easy until you see
A rope dangling on a tree as beautiful
And how your neck completes the circuit.
The only thing stopping you
Is the fear of the other side-
how death will leave you hanging.
I will be okay.
you tell self.
I will cry to death my demons
If they survive,
You tell self.
I will slit wrists and name
Them exit.
If they won’t go,
You tell self
I will swallow sleeping pills
into my body as missiles
And as I explode to highs destructive,
You will label me a nutcase!
But I won’t blame you.
I will wait till the day,
Your demons fight your sanity
And you will find me here,
Learning new ways to die
After finding none to live.
You tell self,
One day your tears won’t be seen again
But as soon as you resolve
To love self more. To be unmoved
By the cruelties of this motions
As if having no mercy,
Life happens,
S
L
O
W.
In that moment,
You will run to Love.
What mother never said is that Love
Breaks you to hate.
In that moment,
You will run to God.
What mother never said is that God,
Is like the absent father.
In that moment,
You will run to self.
What mother never said is that self
Is a collection of haunted houses
A display of bloody murders.
In short,
Even you can’t save you.
Gufy (@gufydox) is a 24 year old identifying as a Poetry writer, performer, and an aspiring film maker. He has poetry gig coming up on the 28thth of May;
‘Home is a performance poetry showcase by Gufy that looks to hug the society’s desolation and speak healing to a people that forgot humanity.’
For ticket reservations, contact 0720785173
Advance: Kshs 500
Gate: Kshs 800
*Image by Nick Wilkes, courtesy of Unsplash.
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