Monthly Archives: July 2018

Sharing the Journey, 07-July-2018

Today I’ve returned to a poem from friend and colleague Saddiq Dzukogi, one that was published at Glass: A Journal of Poetry in May 2017: “What The Poem Said”

 
A Poem to the Poem
 

inspired by, and with lines from,
Saddiq Dzukogi’s “What The Poem Said”
 
when the poem shows up again
perhaps (by then) I’ll have the courage
to ask it a question

courage is the heart
perhaps (by then) I’ll have the heart
to ask it a question

fre courage is free will
perhaps (when the poem shows up again)
I’ll have the will to ask it a question

poem! my nemesis… poem!
my playmate… poem! my shadow dance
behind the curtain

poem! you said:
If I stay long enough on a spot,
my feet will become roots

poem, this morning
I stood beside a young magnolia tree
one that’s yet too young to blossom

one I planted some few years ago
from a slip of twig no larger
than my smallest finger

one that has grown
twice as tall as me
poem! dearest poem, pay attention

while I ask this: how may I too
become so patient? how may I make
time to take the time

to put down roots at least as deep
as I’ve grown tall? how may I
make time to take

the time to sip the cups
of last year’s wine, the winter
rains that came and have been

cellared in the darkness
waiting for someone to put down roots
deep enough to drink them?

poem! dearest poem, tell me:
how may I sit here in the evening
beneath this tree and listen

to the smallest of musicians,
the voices / the crickets make at night,
the poem, a prayer / same as a song?

–07-July-2018, Halima Ayuba (Laura M Kaminski)

 

lyrical alignment: Richard Rodriguez

Perfect! Thank you for this light today, José Angel Araguz!

The Friday Influence

This week’s lyrical alignment is drawn from an interview with writer Richard Rodriguez conducted by Hector A. Torres for the book Conversations with Contemporary Chicana and Chicano Writers (University of New Mexico Press).

louiskahnI came across the passage below from a journal entry during my third year doing the PhD. I remember being struck by Rodriguez’s apt and rich metaphor in response to being asked about style. Not only is the narrative he develops through anecdote compelling, but the way he pivots its meaning towards his own writing process at the end really hits home with me. It’s the kind of statement that acknowledges the form and method side of writing but also allows for the fluidity and surprise that lie at the heart of the best writing.

In setting the prose into verse, I settled on working with five words per line; while the poem ends unevenly outside this…

View original post 288 more words

Sharing the Journey, 05-July-2018

#BREATHE

for Romeo, grateful to be sharing the journey today
https://www.facebook.com/oriogun/posts/10155795450053719

A seed beneath the soil sleeps
The garden knows it’s there

A seed beneath the soil sleeps
The garden leaves it be

A seed beneath the soil sleeps
And the garden knows when the planet tilts
And the soil warms
And the rains come

The seed beneath the soil
Will awake
Unfold itself
Shed the husk
That it no longer needs

The seed that slept emerges
Into light
Takes its place
In life’s larger garden

That which was hidden
Emerges into light

That which was hidden
Continues growing
Prepares itself
To blossom

And the garden exhales
Inhales again
Amin

Sharing the Journey, 02-July-2018

One of the joys of the journey has been collaborative writing…duet poems. Today I have been re-reading and thinking about a poem written about two years ago with my friend Blessing Ojo, and thought I’d share it here.

DAYS LIKE THIS

My eyes witnessed death’s coronation,
the marching of his battalions
a thunderclap that startles peaceful
minds, makes them spread their wings
and take to the sky in panic.

And I rashly took the snapshot of peace
running off. I posted it, that photo.
But the reactions to it! I could never
have imagined there were so many
on the side of war

who were so proud to see death crowned
and marching in the shade
cast by the wings of his vulture wazirs.
Then, the light of hope eloped too
to escape holocaust.

That, I couldn’t snapshot
for it passed fleetingly.

— Blessing Ojo & Halima Ayuba (Laura M Kaminski), 2016

 

Keep staring in the direction of hope…try to capture every glimpse of light, no matter how small or fleeting.

Stay blessed, my friends.

Amin.