Category: Poetry Corner

“Success has nothing to do with Potential”

I heard those words above and it stopped me in my track. It had me thinking. Wait a minute, “success has nothing to do with potential” I repeated this and then I had to agree. But before I agreed I had to recalibrate my thinking quick and in that moment I realised that along the way of life, without giving it a thought I realised I equated having potential with eventually being successful.

Maybe I was slow or a little bit too optimistic or even foolish to think like this, but there you are. However, I thought about it some more, then, I remembered someone I knew who had so much potential. He had so much of it that it was oozing out of him everywhere until that potential choked him or he choked it. But either he never moved beyond having that potential and after a while, no one could see it because he had lost it from ill-use and no use. When that happened everyone who initially cheered him and wished him well and waited for that potential to manifest set aside their banners, silenced their cheers and just disappeared. And could we blame them after all? What is the use of having a constant parade for someone who has nothing to celebrate – just the possibility? And who can take a possibility to the bank or leave it as a legacy? What was even worse was that over time having lost hold of that potential he was relegated to outer darkness, lost, to himself and everyone else.

So, it is true, potential does not equal success to have it mean something you have to do something and then do something and again do something. You have to water and nurture that potential at any and all times, in the face of any and everything. Don’t just have potential, make it work for you.

Some like the Dark

Some like the Dark

Some people are afraid of the light
and can only hide in the dark
quietly
shallow breath
they wait timidly
overwhelmed by the possibility
of being seen
measure
weighed
found wanting.
So they strike 
like a shadow
a phantom of doom
knowing no way
out of their tomb
created by fear
of being seen
andd found wanting.
There they lurk
ghostly figures
trying to refashion ans rework
all the inadequacies
they see in their eyes.

Across the Sea

Do you have a song you can go through for months, even years without hearing and the next time you hear it, it tastes like a sweet piece of your childhood? Well for me one of those songs is “Dreamland” by Marcia Griffiths. Since February is Reggae Month, on the radio you hear every era of reggae music there is, repeatedly. As a child who grew up in the 1990s, this is one of the songs that I would hear all the time on the radio, because my grandmother -saying great-grandmother is too much- would always have the radio on one particular station and this at times was in heavy rotation. So it reminds me of love, the love she had for me reflected in all the sacrifices she made so I lacked nothing. It reminds me of how free I was as a child, free to tell the truth and speak my mind, to be myself -which was often a most precocious child – and to just not worry about what was happening all around me. It reminds me of nights my cousin Gandy and I would have impromptu sing-offs on the verandah where our grandmother would yell at us to, “stop the noise before she shut us up”. And we would stop for a while and then continue, because, hey what were a few minutes of passionate beatings for a good time. Now, those moments, that time, seem so dreamy, bittersweet dreams. At that time we did not know we were making memories that would sustain us through the harsh realities of life. Those moments are frozen in time and from time to time something triggers is to go back and look, and smile teary-eyed smiles of great nostalgic euphoria. So I offer this poem which today this song triggered. I hope you enjoy it.

Across the Sea

What lies there is beyond imagining
only the finer things
at your finger tips
straight to your lips.
nothing as sweet
as knowing your life is complete
your treasure
wild nectar 
dripping slowly down your throat
to hit that sweet spot
then press repeat.
Let's ride the waves of this waterfall
water so pristine
so clear and true
until we hear the call
to levitate to the sky
and count them stars.

After all
this is our dream
we belong to this world
nothing is too extreme
anything and anyone can be redeemed.
After all
isn't this heaven?
Isn't this a dreamland?

One of those days

One of those days.

Just one of those days
when nothing seems to go right
when all around
life's pleasures no longer suffice.
Just one of those days
when you are twisted 
inside out.
Just one of those days
when Joy is no where about
and your nerves have ran away.
Just one of those days
when all you have to celebrate
is making it through that day.

I’m Tired

I'm Tired

I'm tired of you
and all you do
to make lies true
when you do whatever to
make me the one who
had to pursue
while you unbothered pursue
your pleasures.

I'm tired
and I want out
now!
Do you hear me?
Can you see me?
Do you even know me?
I don't think you do.
But that's staying true to you
so what's new.
I guess I was the fool
who clung to this mirage of untruths.