nicholasdamionalexander

Old paradox, new verse

2012-02-27T07:43:00.002-08:00

A heavy mist rises
out of the valley
like gun smoke, rifling
the air, setting off a time piece
of timelessness.

The sound of dew dripping
from leaves, but no dew felt.

This unmetered rural wetness
that meets me most mornings
ever since I’ve transported
to this mystic realm.

This meditation, this poetry.

A thousand unspoken words
inhabit these fat, yellow-green leaves;
these long limbs.
These crooked Einstein branches.

The figure in the cane
whose greetings each morning
without language haunt me.
The sunless days and moonless nights
are the old paradox
of my new verse.

Anything can inspire me

2012-02-27T07:42:00.000-08:00

Anything can inspire me

Anything can inspire me to verse:
a dog sleeping soundly
on a makeshift veranda
thick croton flowers lining a sloping path
leading to an outside wash area
lanky trees spiralling to the heavens
like the hope of a family
praying, Love is enough
is stronger than death
richer than wealth

But what gives the greatest inspiration
is the smell of seasoned meat
sizzling in a pot
drifting across the valley
lifting sweet scents to the open air

In the trenches

2011-02-18T07:49:00.000-08:00

IN THE TRENCHES

From the trenches he heard the blast

of bombs booming in the near distance,

saw the heavy clump of black smoke

twisting like a tornado;

and thought of life back home:

a wife and kids full of love and concern.

It was once the picture of the perfect life-

the dog bathed on Sunday mornings,

the pop-corned ice cream visits to the park

by evening. But now, as he huddled there

under the raised mount of protection,

he looks around at the new family:

hard-faced men dressed

in heavily-clad war drab,

holding cold, hard metal, firing;

ready to die yet hoping, remembering

the family they left back home.

BY: Nicholas Damion Alexander

Coldfront

2011-01-13T13:02:00.000-08:00

Cold Front

A sudden surge of wind supported the forecast
a cold front pending
descending
from the north in this the year's final month
moist wind traveling
from the tip of the Caucus mountains
raging down on our little island paradise
like slavery
Snapping winds like the curl
of cruel whips lashing our ancestors' backs
oppress us now-Romans to Christ
And then, rain rain rain!
Like the rising waters of the Middle Passage
drowning us now in a sudden surge of frigidity
like the greed of imperialism's rage.

Thursday, 30 December 2010 19:39 Nicholas Damion Alexander Xtra Poetry Jam(The Black Collegian)

poetry

2011-01-10T07:15:00.000-08:00

Nicholas Damion Alexander
MY MOTHER’S SALT&

1.
My mother cooked with salt,
flavoring our lives
with the spice of her choice . . .
A white grain from the sea
that added new worlds of taste
to children made of mixed spices.
2.
My father loved his pepper
heating up her pot
with its red flames,
that little masculine bulb
men use to show bravado
about nothing.
3.
We ate of Mother’s salt
all of our lives till we grew
old enough to insist
she travel to the sea
of her spice, away
from the red heat
of our father’s pepper.
4.
Today, fifteen years on
my mother has stopped
cooking with that spice
as white as my father’s skin.
And we have grown accustomed
to his hot spice,
46
hardly remembering
her love for little white grains
drawn from the sea.
Calabash

The Body Politic

We are the body politic,
the ones who walk the city's streets
in search of salvation
                                  and home.

We crowd the buses to heaven
hoping that some illiterate preacher
will teach us the meaning of life;

thinking that somehow meaning
will unfold from nonsense
like truth from lies.

That something will emerge
from nothing
                  like genesis.

That new beginnings will commence
from old ceaseless ends.

And so, we rush by each other
on the streets, daily going to and from
places of work and the ones we call home,

unaware that salvation is
our own dependence on each other.

                                          Nicholas Alexander

The viscosity of infidelity

The night takes flight on the shifting

vicissitudes of reason

expanding its wings like vulture;

on the deep edge of treason.

The verisimilitude of love

floats in the air like wind-

an ill wind, tepid and so strange

and full of hidden sin.

It is then the viscosity

of infidelity

can be felt floating in the heart

with such sterility.

Wings that soar ominously, claws

that curl with cringing dread

heat up the night; and an unreal

swelling inside one's head.

The latest messiah

The loss of phone represents

carelessness with family.

The couch used as an outlet

for charging this tool of communication-

the same one lounged in

without thought of strife-

is a death bed where your killers

conspire to hack you in. Disregard

the smiling faces- the best of men

in all the world's races, whose hearts are pure,

have fallen victim to this trap:

Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jnr.,

Jesus Christ and now, you-the world's latest

messiah, dying in vain for its sin.

Troy

They were all men preoccupied

with the fame that death would bring.

Honor for them

was war and living through it; history

the sweet thrill of their blood mingled with dust.

So they wrote their names in the sands

of time, with the sword of generations.

Their spirits in a piece of steel passed down

from father to son: that was the great honor

of being a soldier of Troy, much deeper

than love and more powerful than death.

Nicholas Alexander