Jaachi Writes

Featured Poem: Vanity At The Door - by Martins Deep  You can hear the market noise And in the very midst detect that voice. Stories available are all a tragedy. At the door knocks Vanity. A guest unbidden is at the door Beckoning the victim of want to venture. "Go away!" You bark at it And curse him with no regret. He's passing by your block again His rich perfume heralds him The beast within That barked yesterday is going lame. Your needs attends you Weeping in your empty teacup You sip and spew And vow to keep your door locked up. Life turns out to be a guitar on one string And circumstances have changed the lyric of all that you sing. Midnight and you are nursing a wailing stomach Ears intently poised to hear the guest's knock. You unlock the bolt and let the door ajar. He turns a friend that was a stranger. You kiss his brow and apologize But man is here for business. He tells you the price. There is no going back. You've got wheat, oil and silver Your eyes wi

In front of the person you love, your heart beats faster But in front of the person you like , you get happy. In front of the person you love, winter seems like spring But in front of the person you like, winter is just a beautiful winter. If you look into the eyes of the one you love, you blush But if you look into the eyes of the one you like, you smile. In front of the person you love, you can’ t say everything on your mind But in front of the person you like, you can. In front of the person you love, you tend to get shy But in front of the person you like, you can show your own self. Then person you love comes into your mind every 2 minutes. You can’t look straight into the eyes of the one you love But you can always smile into the eyes of the one you like. When the one you love is crying, you cry with them But when the one you like is crying, you end up comforting. The feeling of love starts from the eye And the feeling of like starts from the ear. So if you stop liking a person y

I fear to tell you Why I go to the dark cave every evening. If you must know Its because she that my soul loves is a dragon. A wild beast. She devours my fears. She invades my mind and dispels My doubts. She dethrones my ego And breaks the walls of hate. She sinks the ships of depression I surrendered as she broke down my gates. She has taken the empire of my soul. Can you find her kind In the book of animals? She haunts the cities Of my painful past And brings to me spoils. Wisdoms. She is not beautiful? Your eyes will never tell you she is. Her beauty is not given for the  eyes to behold. Your eyes will lie to you. She breathes fire; I burn. She beats my pen into a sword; I conquer. She is not among the daughters That go down to the stream With earthen pots to draw water. She is wingless Without the poetry My heartbeats recites. My whispers is the wind She glides in. I sail in her tears To lands eagles have not seen. My ink is the only wine she drinks. She lies drunk in my arms and t

POEM 29: OMALICHA Omalicha, I'll come to you. The first daughter of Mazi Okaka, beautiful and ebony full of contours and beauty. The elders call you, 'asampete nwa' , parents call you, 'ugonnaya' , your mates call you, 'nwamma' . Every man wants to call you 'obim' . I don't want to call you names, I want you to call me 'obim' . Omalicha,  Bia nu ka iburu nkem. I, Jaachi, will appear in court, with heart in cuffs for your heart that I have stolen, and those glances you think I refused to return. Omalicha,  Your radiant face  speaks of smiles; smiles of love. As I hide under the Udala tree where my bicycle you see, I cannot but shy away  as I behold your smile. Odim na obi m. Chai!  Iriela m isi! Nwamma Omalicha, The dream of every man. Omalicha, Your smiles reaches my every part. It reaches down my very heart Down down to my inner man. It paints rainbow on my skyline And makes my heart jingle Like your waist band when you jiggle your wais

An Indian Girl married a Spanish man and went to Spain. She can't speak Spanish. Each time she want to buy Chicken Drumstick at the market, she would lift her skirt and show her thighs to enabled the seller understand her. One day she wanted to buy banana, she took her husband to shop. Do You Know Why? Because he speaks Spanish.  But I like the way you think. You see, people, we are what we think. How we react to situations is determined by the state of our hearts. What do you feed your mind with? Nobody is responsible how your life turns out. You are the driver of your destiny because of what you choose to do and how you chose to react to conditions around you.  How you are today spiritually, mentally, physically, is as a result of decision you took yesterday. The most important of all factors in your life is the mental food in which you live. It is the food, which you furnish to your mind that determines the whole character of your life. It is the thoughts that dominate an

The world sleepeth, not I whose rest flees when I hear the yearning cry Like the wailing knell in the churchyard ...and Bezaleel the son of Uri within comes alive. He teacheth my fingers to weave Worlds bygone and coming on leaves. I sail wherever with my disguised sceptre. Returning with a thousand ethereal sheaves. O Prisoner behind the bars of my soul What gainest thee so That thy errands hath made of me A mortal never my dreams told? What meanest this quest my pen doth run Like a thirsty hart after a pond? Night after night springs this strange lust And every adventure is a mystery born. The clamour of thy fiery harp Charms my heart like honey drops I yield as a man to the snare of a seductress I lay my seven locks on thy laps. It is now I who stands obsessed Keeping you alive like a songbird. I am holding tightly on what once was straw And my lips branded like the psalms of the blessed. No whiskey, rum, nor ale Doth taste like a mug from my inkwell. My ravished soul can no more wi

I THINK I FOUND MYSELF Tonight, I am white and I am full. My smiles are dim and borrowed from the Sun's glow but you don't mind. My surface is all curves and craters, dust and nothing else my face litters, but you don't mind. I have travelled alone through the vacuum of dark, training my mind for this task, building no walls around my heart planting landmines on my tongue watching as you build engines and spacesuits gearing up to come to my cosmic suite. I am the kind of territory you were born to navigate. I am the path you were trained to trade. I am the terrestrial ball you were born to conquer. You know by heart every treacherous route through these white dunes that litter my faint hue. You have drawn maps of my every scar and devices instruments to monitor my rise and my fall my hideout in snow and fall. And you find me. You take me. With your space shuttle And crew of happy 'nauts You leap into the sky pierce through the clouds farting from your behind black fume

POEM 27: RELIVING MEMORIES (II) As I traveled on past's path debris of memories litter the ground flooding my heart with smiles smiled and cries cried and friends had flash by like lightening in a night sky, exposing grey clouds sneaking by. And I remembered... Precious memories how they linger in my soul. I peeked into the past to say goodnight, to memories I left behind. Then I heard my a voice in a corner It said,  "...and for my darling damsel, scarlet ribbons for her hair." I fine tuned my receptors I recognized the voice. Mine I peeked in through the window blind I saw the boy on his knees,  with closed eyes He's me. And I remembered... Precious memories how they linger in my soul. All the prayers gone unanswered  captured by time's timely shutters. Though last night was dark and bare.  All the wishes wished by bedtime recorded by the walls ever listening ears slowly slowly played back again. And I remembered... Precious memories how they linger in my soul.

POEM 26: THAT'S AMORE I have read you, like every poet should read the other, like I read the Songs of Solomon Sèi bellissima My amore Your beauty like the fragrance of a rose with petals as still as water. My hands pricked by the thorns that your contours surround, embrace still I enclose. That's amore. Who's goddess Diana? Who's Queen Vashti? Who's Hadassah? My diva, amore solo tè, Per sempre insieme. Your black is beautiful like the golden glow of a thousand burning coal. I have heard you sing that song that strikes a chord, a melody A symphony in my soul which make me cry 'Amore ti amo!' I have tasted you; For more than anything, you are sweetest. More than anything, you are sweetness. I have tasted you; the virtue of your treasure chest of creamy love of comfy lures L'amore.  Senza finé amo. ========= Glossary: Amore: Love  Sèi bellissima: You are beautiful Amore solo tè: My only love Per sempre insieme: Forever together Amore ti amo: I love you, l

'The PIN magazine, Expound, WRR Poetry, My Mind Snaps, etc, which may be seen as local blogs/magazines/organizations, are more reputable than some of the foreign publications that we know worship.'  -  Kukogho Iruesiri Samson This got me thinking. What's so special about being published by foreign magazines, blogs, journals, etc?  Why are we African writers like this? Why do we find it unexciting to feature our works on our local magazines, blogs and journals? How will we have big literary bodies in Africa when we crawl overseas for recognition and endorsement?  Isn't this a mental colonization? It isn't? What then could it be? Personally, I don't find foreign submissions, recognition and endorsements exciting. Would rather send my works to local e-magazines, blogs, websites and my blog. Nigerian literature will remain colonized by the 'west' if we keep demeaning our local literary initiatives.  We should learn to support our local literary blogs, journa

Do You Remember? (Duet) The first time we met,  we stared at each other and never stopped staring even as we tried to look away.  The moment I saw you,  my heart never stopped racing  and I realized your specie is beyond this plane. Those words you said to me,  and your smile that struck to memory,  And made me smile whenever I remember... You were like the skinned knee of a playful boy; innocence oozed from your words. I knew it that though the tingle that in my heart jingle I would always of our first time remember. It was on January I met you,  It was on January your poems gave me a clue; Soon we'll be seeing day and night,  The day suddenly filled with light,  It was also sudden, a short tryst I thought,  But my quill you seem to have caught. I don't think there has been regrets,  Now we're doing a duet....  Who would have known what lay behind the door? Who would have opened the door? Do you remember how you stared at words that dripped on and on like honey from it'