PAT ASHINZE - POEMS

 Pat Ashinze is an hybrid of two major Nigerian tribes: Igbo and Yoruba. 
He is fluid in his writings, creating poetry and prose within the axial stream of metaphors and aphorisms.
His works have appeared and are forthcoming on The Pangolin Review, Kalahari review, Blognostics,  Merak Mag, Dissident Voice, Vox Poetica, Ngiga review, Ann Arbor review, Mohave Heart review, Writers Newsletter, Tuck Magazine, I am Not a Silent Poet and elsewhere.

BODY SHAMING.
​

​if you think the grace of a woman
is only in the curve of her hips
and the shape of her breasts,
and the sleekness of her body,
and in the lush vitality of her portal,
then, you do not understand how to read
beneath the jagged lines - the sacred geometry that make up her glorious heart
and her beautiful mind.
 
if you think the beauty of a man
is in the brazenness of his looks
or in the gallantry of his muscles,
or in the tallness and swiftness of gait,
or in the heraldry of his bulging arms,
or in the curly ruddiness of his frame,
or in the beastliness of his nether regions:
then - you do not know how to identify
gods amidst a myriad lot of guns and roses.
 
if only you could listen
to the wailings of their punctured minds,
you would hear prisoners begging to be released.
you will see lost travelers seeking for doors to self-discovery.
you will see spirits roaring at the inconsiderateness of idiots trying to play God.
 
now listen, as the moon does to the sun:
they are not flat or too thin,
they are not globose or too fat,
they are not malformed or maladapted,
they are deities, crafted by the universe.
they are pollen, blown by the wind
to fill the earth with flowers and colours.
they are richly filled in places we can not see.
be thou illumined.

​DEATH

​they say death ends all our woes.
i do not know. not yet.
maybe soon. or later. or never.
my bible tells me my soul is immortal.
even other holy books.
and the internet.
 
but seriously,
it is hard to understand death.
we run away from it everyday,
like monks avoiding the touch of sin -
but it's all encyclical and vaguely brusque.
truth is: death has a way - of making us make
our way back to her macabre bosom.
 
i have decided to write this like i am drunk,
even though I'm not. seriously, i'm not.
i don't feel like versing mystic aphorisms.
not on this. people get bored easily.
so, I'll make this simple. very simple.
 
death screws with us all. a lot.
it takes the pearls and leaves us wondering
if God really cares about our miserable lives.
death sucks out the things that matter,
leaving dregs, dirt and regret as souvenirs.
 
ah… death!. alright... I'll make it simpler:
death is the middle finger that life
points at us all as it whispers her
cold, numbing words in our mundane ears:
"Hey! Nobody has a right to be arrogant!."
 
…

​LOFTY DRIFT 

​nothing makes
a man look stupid
like misery
and failure.
And love.
 
i tell you, dear reader -
not because i have drank sour wines;
not because i have seen the sky bleed;
not because my memories have grown
grey beards and have become arthritic;
i tell you this to show you the vanity
behind having an human existence.
 
the mind of every man is full of grief:
sorrows that sting like desert arachnids and
hurt like the jests of blasphemous demons.
we hide our pains behind our teeth everyday,
praying in sad notes for death to run away,
waiting for God to show his face in the clouds.
 
if you see a man crying, run!
his soul is filled with shadows.
his memories are naked and wet.
run before his misery spreads and
makes you a city beneath the earth.
 
happiness requires sacrifice.
it is the reward for hearts
that have chosen to ignore pain
and learnt to live in a world
filled with dangling windows,
punctured destinies, broken stories,
desolate cities and empty rooms.
happiness is not for cowards.
be illumined.
 
...
 

​IMPRESSIONS

​a public creed teaches us
that first impressions are lasting ones
by which we build people’s characters,
premonitions and limitations from.
do not believe it, dear reader.
it is an old and rusty philosophy.
it has not evolved with time.
it is an often misguided truth.
 
i have known prostitutes
whose portals have entertained demons
and legions of insatiable men at the start,
but once you get to know these women
of the night street for the humans
that they really are, you get to see for
yourself that even darkness illuminates;
that even ashes spark fire.
 
i have known exemplary saints who have
sworn to the earth and sky and sea and fire
that they have seen God;
that they have heard his voice
and perceived his deafening heartbeat but
if you get closer and deeper to their soul realms,
you would see abysses and wormholes
that can swallow a nation and send
chills down the spine of angels.
 
see, my dear reader, life is hard.
the heart roams around in sheathed cycles,
hiding realness and portraying illusions.
it takes time to differentiate worms from caterpillars.
it is only one that turns into a butterfly.
be illumined.
…