Cryland Woes and Other Poems
()
About this ebook
For privileged cups have emptied rivers
And sudden shock of burning thirst
Threatens the mother pot.
Poetry or prophecy, these riveting lines present a sample of the tour de force behind this cover, a poets explosive anger at the parlous state of his country. Adroitly couched in words that leap at you, the verses in this handy book are smouldering faggots that signal a looming but avoidable catastrophe.
Onyechi Mbamali writes with rare passion, addressing universal issues by proxy reference to his beloved country. You could feel the pain in his brief preface to this collection wherein he alludes to a great nation belittled and bewildered by poor leadership and decades of shallow conversation. Actually, the sufferings and social scourges afflicting his country may have echoes and mirrors in other parts of the world. But the difference that galls this poet is the shocking absence of meaningful conversation in his land of birth. Hear him in Rumble Of Stubble II:
But not a voice to speak for them
The jobless throngs in mimes of death
Too young to die, too old to cry
The empty lives that vultures trail
With patient smiles of grave robbers
Which voice is heard in word of them?
Not the law, neither the prophets
For the law in the land is a lie
And the prophets lose themselves in
Doublespeak where thief is chief
This collection of poems is stringed into a compelling narrative, a hazardous road journey complete with mementoes, myths and musings. There are questions of fact to rouse the nation from her numbing sleep and the inexcusable mass poverty that shames her plenitude of natural endowments. Some of the questions touch on the predatory talons of thieving oligarchs, some others rip the masks of deception off race and creed to expose the real issues that undermine peace and progress. Ultimately, Cryland Woes and Other Poems is a clarion call to a timely awakening. Only the deaf may ignore these telling verses....
Onyechi Mbamali
Onyechi Mbamali resides in Lagos, Nigeria. Lone Witness and Other Poems, his second book of poems, follows the first, Cryland Woes and Other Poems, published in December 2013. His other books in the Authorhouse stable are drama classics titled Shadows of The Ancestors, Your Man Abednego and When The Scorpion.
Read more from Onyechi Mbamali
When the Scorpion: A Play in Four Acts Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsShadows of the Ancestors: A Play in Three Acts Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLone Witness and Other Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsYour Man Abednego: A Play in Four Acts Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Cryland Woes and Other Poems
Related ebooks
Valence: Considering War through Poetry and Theory Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Mapping the Delta Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Alien Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Drowned Book: Picador Classic Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Waiting for Wovoka: Envoys of Good Cheer and Liberty Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDuck Soup and Swansongs Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLife Through My Glasses: Collected Poems, 1950–2011 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWord Bombs Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCountry of Lost Sons, The: Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLiving in Death: A Comparative Critique on the Death Poetry of Emily Dickinson and T.S. Eliot Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAntiquity Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Bhopal Dance: A Novel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Church of Omnivorous Light: Selected Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFor Greatness and Freedom I Came: Faust or Fast? Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBitter Fruit: A Novel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMidland Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCustomary Etiquettes: Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsColony Collapse Disorder Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSnake In The Spine, Wolf In The Heart Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsButtercup Yellow Straw Boaters: Deconstructions of War Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsReenactments Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5To Ukraine, With Love: Benefit Anthology for Ukraine Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNocturnal Notes Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTesting the Elements Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings“Lessons” in Courage: Poems for My Ukrainian Friends Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDiary of an Extinction: Consciousness Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVoice of My Soul: Along the Hopeful Trail Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMafofora Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsConversing with Stones: The Collected Poems of Neil Baker Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Poetry For You
The Things We Don't Talk About Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Way Forward Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Beyond Thoughts: An Exploration Of Who We Are Beyond Our Minds Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Love Her Wild: Poems Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Pillow Thoughts II: Healing the Heart Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Selected Poems Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5You Better Be Lightning Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Bedtime Stories for Grown-ups Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Odyssey Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDaily Stoic: A Daily Journal On Meditation, Stoicism, Wisdom and Philosophy to Improve Your Life Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Leaves of Grass: 1855 Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Prophet Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Rumi: The Art of Loving Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Inward Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dream Work Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Waste Land and Other Poems Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dante's Inferno: The Divine Comedy, Book One Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Twenty love poems and a song of despair Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tao Te Ching: A New English Version Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Enough Rope: Poems Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Divine Comedy: Inferno Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Iliad: The Fitzgerald Translation Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson (ReadOn Classics) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Odyssey: (The Stephen Mitchell Translation) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Edgar Allan Poe: The Complete Collection Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Complete Poems of John Keats (with an Introduction by Robert Bridges) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Gilgamesh: A New English Version Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Tradition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Related categories
Reviews for Cryland Woes and Other Poems
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
Cryland Woes and Other Poems - Onyechi Mbamali
Part One
Of Destiny Wolves
They filled the spring nest with angry nails
To bruise the new-born day
We in wake, wee little birds, met it that troublous way
There was the jumbled joy, the tumbled trove
The mangled manse and the tangled tape
There was the tendon truce
There were the story cooks and the tale bearers
There were the black poolers and the back-heelers
There was the candour cove
There were the mumbling mobs and stumbled stomps
The tongue tippers and trunk teasers
There was the Pilate wash
Where they stopped the pit swore vipers
The gold cup confessed sins of innocence
Moon and stars the invoked witnesses
Horrors of midnight, raw as betrayals
Ascend slopes of treachery to wonder heights
Gather home tarantulas
Even the hangman wept and