• Students have revolted to the reopening of schools, prompting artistic reflection
Image: GEORGE OWITI
Of Sirens and Sirens
Sitting on the culvert of Thought /The waters of Time slowly slides /Like moments arrested by Worry
Broadcasts shout of new normalcy / Where the Bishop preaches online / Mosques host pigeons in tranquility
Humans shake hand with head nod / Time ceasing to bring out meanings / With each wave of the new pandemic
The mind mutates into an ambulance / Whose siren of danger mimics sirens / Of cop cars speeding to schools ablaze.
The Echoes of Midnight
The night speaks in machine accents / Grinding away like rust on the joints / That form clouds of confusion here….
The machinery of the night is ancient / It has served the people of the world / Since the dawn of time and dusk too
Today the saddler of this contraption / Sits with the face cupped in the palm / Pondering where to harvest this time
Tomorrow the country will welcome / The new day with yawns and frowns / As news of a new arson rises like dawn
The television will compete with radios / To present the most vivid view of it all / Hear distant echoes of the night drone?
Black is the Sky of Grey Roses
Black is the rose of grey roses! / It resembled the ashes of now / Which sit on the hearth of here
The hearth, yes here you behold / The stories by firesides once told / By folks of old who now mute are
It is the ash that dances now here / Wisdom like the old, long left here / Only the bleak walls hem us in now
The remnants of gardens of wisdom / Now haunt the desolate empty days / They say the death of the old is bitter
Yet it is the death of the young that is / As we watch them burn their schools… / Sending smoke like black roses up high.
The Booth and the Tooth
The tooth is where we bury wishes / That when in the wake of new days / With sun rays we will hunt for hopes
The hole is where we let beetles find / The tooth from the hole of innocence / That which sows shyness in milk teeth
Then comes the new hole like this one / Where the innocent shed off like teeth / Of the young who grow into new selves
In this absence of the hole of old selves / We miss the innocent smiles and teeth… / Now stands here a staunch and flat face
Yet is this not the face so familiar surely / The face that shed teeth we buried here / The teeth that made the young grow up?
Today I stand at the booth a coin in hand / The news that came of arson and of sons / Shattered the innocence of bygone youth
In its place stands the mist of spectacles / Eyes of the world now blinded by wonder / How will we smile at tomorrow here anew?