Wish Me Well

By Godwin Matsiko

" 

… poets are ghost writers, blank pages. Who then is the author? 

The collection starts with a scribe yielding to a long introspective verse on philosophy, metaphysics and everyday concerns by everyday people.

 

The collection is then divided into little chapbooks, ten in number; organized as a biographical train of thought. It covers conflicts of existence and generational relationships, rural life mores and peri urban struggles. Through omniscient, male, female, old, young, human, flora and fauna personae, the collection critiques our acceptance of African social and political life. How much of the problem or solution is an extension of ourselves?  

 

…the end is a whiteboard, a canvas itching to be filled. Who then takes the reins?"

• Language: English
• Publisher: Godwin Matsiko
• Release date: Apr 7, 2024
• ISBN: 9798224034178

Book preview

MATSIKO GODWIN MUHWEZI

POEMS

WISH ME WELL

Reflections In Verse

ISBN:978-9913-9891-1-4

Copyright © Matsiko Godwin Muhwezi 2022

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All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, audio, visual or otherwise, without prior permission of the copyright owner. Nor can it be circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without similar conditions including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

Dedication

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To

Matsiko Ghiana (Iranzi)

Poets are ghost writers

Who sometimes reveal

The storyteller!

Contents

Prologue.....................................

Ground Zero...................................

Inception........................................

The Deep End................................

Hanging On.................................

Wading Through .............................

Coming of Age...............................

Adulting.......................................

No Love Lost...............................

The Jury Is Still Out ........................

Epilogue.......................................

"... Just get yourself together

Or we might as well say goodbye

What good is a love affair

When you can't see eye to eye..."

From the song, "if you don’t know me by now"

Songwriters: Kenny Gamble / Leon Huff

Recordings:

Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes - 1972

Patti Labelle -1985

Simply Red -1989

Seal - 2008

Prologue

REFLECTIONS IN VERSE

Is there such a thing

As good melancholy?

Is it different

If it emanates

From a deeper place,

Even beyond-

The marsh of disjointed thoughts,

Or deeply embedded introspection?

It might very well be

A stream flowing-

Of its own accord,

Making its way as we let it,

Being mere vessels.

When we go stargazing,

Do we ever ask

Who rides the  milky way?

Are constellations-

Too grand to decipher?

It is perhaps enough

For mere mortals-

To learn-

That the moon reflects the sun.

That other balls of mass

Litter the night sky,

From light years beyond.

And the earth

May be round,

Oval,

Or four dimensional.

But,

Who lives in the great beyond?

Who plays Beggar My Neighbour-

With comets and asteroids?

Do stars-

Take sojourn below the clouds?

Do they,

Unlike us,

Despise the law of gravity?

Maybe,

They are the wind that blows,

To hug hapless damsels.

And the rain that falls,

To kiss the juicy lips of our soils.

The mountains that tower,

To peek at our secret scenes.

And keep our perspiring temples,

Within refined crosshairs.

Who are we to each other?

When our eyes lock-

Iris to iris,

Are we random beings-

Wading through each other’s halitosis?

If life,

Is a rolling motion picture,

Are we then-

Extras falling into our set part of the script?

Glove in hand,

Table reading our lines and gesticulating,

Only to aptly miss from the credits rolling by?

Maybe we are journeymen

In someone else’s gig,

Or greenhorns-

Lucky to go up thither.

How do you measure-

The thickness of water and blood?

Do you ever-

Need one and not the other?

How warm-

Is the chest of a fair weather pal?

Is an embrace-

Good enough when it lasts?

Who ignites-

The roadside romance,

To enmesh total strangers-

Into the embers

Of blissful union?

Maybe our souls are a tapestry,

Marinated into a grand thesis-

Of the tragedy

And comedy of our species.

Our dealings-

May be transient,

Or the whispers in our tête à tête

May be eternal.

When swords-

Are drawn

And pointed,

What is the soldier’s role?

A puppet following orders,

Or a human-

With a seared conscience?

What amounts to a good day at work,

For the soldier,

The undertaker

And the hatchetman?

Is life a game,

The Trip to Jerusalem?

Who moves the chairs,

Who calls the tune?

Who sets the pace

For a tortoise

For a cheetah?

Why are trees

Never interested in sprinting?

And the switch in our lungs,

Can it be hacked?

Who then,

Rigs for the relay team?

Maybe someone decides

How the baton

Is to be passed on-

From one generation

To the next,

Dishes out rewards

For mere effort,

And decides

Where the air we breathe

Takes its lunch,

Before blowing on

To the next client.

What happened

To Mirambo,

The African Bonaparte from Nyamwezi?

Will the Germans apologise to Nyungu-ya-Mawe?

Maybe,

Bukuku was bribed-

To open the gates for Bachwezi aristocrats.

Maybe,

We have become the scum of the earth,

To be herded about

By an evolved clique of cretins;

A far cry

From immortalised Cretan lords.

Why did we curse -

The pale coloured anthropophagist?

If our intention-

Was to feast-

On the entrails of our own?

Why do we sell our souls-

To the pontification of lies?

Maybe,

He preyed on our naivety,

And the ravages of time-

Trained our pallets for his ways,

Where do we place-

The political morality:

Of-

Race,

Tribe,

Class,

ejusdem generis?

Ever thought that maybe,