POEM OF THE WEEK

Soups

Who remembers having soup on Saturday?

Sure you do! It was customary to see Mom in the kitchen as early as the rooster crows

Preparing turnips, pumpkins, carrots, Irish potatoes. Oh yes! Who can forget the flour dumpling?

Dumplings without cornmeal and as huge as a cartwheel,

Yellow yam as dry as starch, and cocoa too

Garlic, dasheen, escallion and, yes, the Scotch bonnet pepper for that flavour

Do you remember that big aluminium pot that was only used on Saturdays?

For soup, whether its chicken feet

Red peas soup with salt beef and soup bone

Green gungo soup with salt beef and soup meat

Manish water with goat meat or fish tea soup

You had no choice in the matter, not at age nine or 10

You either had mom's soup or went hungry

As you grew into a teen, you found out that you did have a choice

To go on the road and buy fast food

With friends who were rebelling themselves

No more soups

It wasn't macho to stay at home having soup when

All the community boys were going to Saturday matinee with their girls, or so you were led to believe

Have you continued the tradition with your family now that you are all grown up?

Or have you thrown wind to that which has identified us as Jamaicans?

What do you remember about your soup experience?

Which is your favourite soup?

This girl is on fire!

Be careful what you wish for.

It will come to you!

I was searching for a hot girl.

My wish came true.

I met this girl who was so hot

That I started feeling the heat too.

She had hot flashes ... menopause.

I thought it was voodoo!

- Anthony E. Morgan
________________________

I am ready to love

Let me love you like no other has loved you

No distraction, no holding back

No crazy jealousy, no hasty fling

No hook-ups about the ex

Leave the past in the past

Let's go out and make a blast

I want the present to be the best

And the future better than the rest

A prosperous one filled with adventure.

I am ready to love you

Let me express the great feeling that I feel for you

Let the angels fold their wings at the display of our love

Let us dream magical dreams

And let us make them a reality

See the princess marry her prince

Watch the butterflies decorate the heavens as my love descends like a dove

Red roses bloom brighter as my love multiplies.

I am ready to love you

Your love means so much to me

I have grown to love you, can't you see?

You make me blush so easily

Your smiles touch me so delicately

Heart to heart connection

Soon a whole bodily connection

Ultimately a soul to soul connection

Magically, mystically mesmerising

Your aura is so appealing

This connection is so revealing

Concentrate on me and you because I am ready to love you.

- Erika N. Heslop
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I need you, you need me

My love upsets you; wade in bitterness,

Call us 'Mr and Mrs Smith'; it'd be closest to the truth,

I need you and I'm not psychotic,

You weakened my bloodline; call me anemic.

Push me with the vibration from your walking hips

Inject me passionately with healing medicine from your sacred lips

My tears speak loneliness to the pillow of

U missing - WE kissing

I need you, don't you need me?

Ask not for what you won't be able to decipher,

Your expression of love strongly wavers,

To utter my needs upon your eardrums would be murder,

Ww wrote ... love quotes, we love, you, I

But how to heal your loneliness when we ne'er see eye to eye ... ?

My heart is like a computer, this absence in silence let's start to devour.

I'm not Chris Brown, but be my Rihanna,

Wrap me up with floating hearts

And stride with me under this secret umbrella.

Build the brand bridge in this gap called separation

Let this space on our keyboard be obliteration.

I need you.

Need is your illusion,

'Deserted' too long, I struggle with the bubble of hallucination

Love was the mirage; I could never be your Rihanna, I'm too crisp

Seems like I was your psychiatrist

We lived it la vida loca in your delusions

Your heart was a computer

Too hard for my software.

I craved your attention

But call me 'chemicals' you had me in suspension.

Like Jesus, throw love at me, from the top of your mountain,

Run it down to the sea of my right knee.

Set aside your eye shadow,

Put down your face brush,

Take me and let's make up.

Why don't you love me?

I've asked countless times,

If questions were a felony, you'd make me commit a crime,

I need you, you need me? Do you ... I drown in your dearth of verbs,

If this was the Nobel prize of love, you'd be awarded for your words ...

... only your words

I feel as if this is one of the random days,

Where love means nothing I won't say only, but show,

Like Emo-Kid, I keep forgetting to remember

Our distance, let's lay it on the mat, I know God likes that.

I need you, you need me.

Turning the wheels of sorrow, leave doubt - let it be blown away.

A stick from my pocket striking a box from your purse,

We're burning our days of blunders right before ToL's hearse.

- Daron Chosen Smith & Shanoye Norman

(Think Out Loud Poetry Group)
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My love cocoon

Love flows from my love cocoon

It overflows from me to you

Like a cup that is full and overflowing

My love is overflowing

Like water rushing down the mountains and into the oceans

My love cocoon overflows

My body is full

Filled with the juices of love

Strawberry, cherry, pineapple and grape

My heart oozes out red liquid

Sweet and succulent

Love flows from my love cocoon

Soon it turns into a lovely butterfly

So radiant and so bright

Soaring like an eagle that has taken flight

Visualise my love cocoon

Unleashing a love that is rich and pure

Like a body that is filled with liquid and ready to burst open

It releases through my eyes, my ears, my nose, my mouth

And sends signals to my toes and fingertips

My love cocoon is mature and ready

Ready to open up

Exposing its innermost parts

Expressing the beauty that is within

Experience the energy and dance to the rhythm of my love cocoon.

- Erika N. Heslop
_________________________

Wi a suffa roun' here!

Pickni hungry an' wah fi go to skool but dem nuh have di bus fare.

Wi hungry an' wi cyaan even buy bulla an' pear.

Wi a ded! Wi a suffa roun' here!

Nuh money tu spen' an' dis a di en' a di week.

Di house have needa winda nar door an' di roof a leak.

Mi caana dark. Mi future bleak.

Pikni hungry an' a cry.

Di 'kraas' a livin suh high.

Wi get some scrap metal fi try

But dem mussa wah wi fi die

Su dem put dat deh sit'n pon stan'-by.

Mi a tief light.

Mi kno seh dat nuh right

But di 'infration' a gi mi a big fight.

Pikni hungry. Dem can't be fed.

Wi hungry an cyaan buy bulla ar bred.

Funeral expensive! Undataka nuh tek chek!

Dem dig out yu yeye jus' fi bury di ded.

Ooman bawl out, Lawd, mi hungry till mi belly a bun mi.

Mi go to mi six baby faadas an' dem cuss mi an' run mi.

Mi cyaan beg man cah dem only wah fi wheel an' tun mi.

Mi a tief wata.

Mi nuh have nuh help fi look afta mi six sons an' one dawta.

Di utility companies dem a kill wi.

Wi is like lamb to di slawta.

Look pah di struggle an' hardship wi haffi endure.

Wi sik an tired. Wi cyaan tek it nu more!

Dem cum fi kill wi because wi poor.

Mi pikni dem a suffa. Mi nu have nut'n eena mi purse.

Mi a do mi bes' but tings a get worse.

Mi try everyting but povaty stik pah mi like a curse.

A su di ting set.

Tings tuff. Mi an' mi pikni dem a fret.

Wi squatting an' cyaan pay wi debt.

Some a wi mek 'X' beside di head an som beside di bell.

Politicians come wid sweet mout' but affta election wi suffa like hell.

Wi a suffa roun here! Povaty bind us like a spell!

- Anthony E. Morgan
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Restorative justice: The antidote to crime

Spawned from moral decay and desperation

Reared by greed and intimidation

Is that a crime?

Let me thrive on your fears and be apathetic to the shedding of your tears

Let me grow from your culture of hopelessness which bleeds your voice of action and social consciousness

This augurs well for me, for generations

The haemorrhaging of a 'semi-justified' nation

Yes, you may imprison my mind and body without rehabilitation

But that mirrors a doctor prescribing drugs without any examination

For the root of the problem still lingers and anticipates

The opportunity to sprout, bear fruit and tempt a vessel with its taste

But alas, what is this I see

A domino effect in the change of the mindset of those who were wronged and forced to grieve

Who realise that the power of forgiveness far outweighs pent-up hatred and anger

Who realise that releasing the burden of revenge can only make them stronger

So they extend the olive branch which only seems to get longer

It is through their bravery, how cowardice my act was highlighted

It is through their act of love and kindness I realise how my wrongful actions made me feel slighted

Me wronging society is no retribution for society robbing me of a fruitful past

Me wronging society is no retribution for society not giving me a chance

So the victim and offender find a common ground to heal and no longer is the act of peace concealed

I can replace the physical void I left by stealing what was yours

But the mental scars from my act, you may never ignore

But through our actions, we can only hope

That restorative justice the future will only show

So that the links in the crime chain can finally break

To spell out p-e-a-c-e, peace

What this world really needs

- Shari

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Democracy for sale

How many investors were never paid?

Many were duped into investing their life savings

How many politicians and political parties benefitted?

How many lives were ruined?

It was an alternative investment scheme

Ponzi!

It was the best of times

It was the worst of times for many others

Years later

Court cases, law suits are everywhere

Cries of denial and despair fill the air

Dirty money

Everything surely has a price

Democracy for sale

Going once, going twice

Sold!

- Wayne Campbell
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Together we can do anything; We will rise

Imagine, living in a world where children are not safe,

Sometimes I sit and wonder if there's a safer place.

I want to be held by the hands of the Almighty Father,

For He alone can help me to push and go farther.

I want to smile, but at times it's hard,

For no matter what I do, I could never mend your heart.

It's not easy losing a friend, here today, gone tomorrow,

I wish I had an extra heart so you could borrow.

Mom watches the news every night with tears in her eyes,

'Cause she mourns for the mothers who visit their children on ice.

Then she looks at me with a forced smile,

For even though she's sad, she's happy I'm still alive.

It's crazy, just thinking how a mother or father could kill their child,

Why do they allow the devil to let them behave so wild?

So I pause for a moment to whisper a prayer,

Dedicated to all the children so God will give them power.

"Gentle Jesus meek and mild,

Look upon a little child."

BOW! What's that I hear?

Footsteps outside, I hide under my bed in fear.

Another one gone like the wind,

My heart leaps, my head spin.

What can we do in a society like this?

Stand up and face them? Fight fist to fist?

But what good will that do? What will be the prize?

I know together we can do anything, we will rise.

- Kimberly Ebanks