Neighbours Poem by Chukuemeka Akpe

Adorations at dawn stir my supine soul wide-awake
Imploring serial banters of roosters rudely unheralded.
Genuflecting knees and yawning hands offering thanks
Invite the neighbourhood with tambourines and hymns.

Ocular daggers unsheathed from the vista of the chamber
Plunge into my back draining flows of invisible blood.
As intuitive pulses force a pirouette of maladroit ballerina,
A white flash of “Good Morning Neighbour” dazzled me.

Loquacious battles mutate Sylphes into svelte felines
Charging blindly at opponents with the weight of words,
The roars attracting furtive glances behind parted curtains.
But only black clad officials arrive as Good Samaritans.

Fiestas bring an enduring aroma of friendliness and love.
Carded felicitations come in droves but end up as festoons.
The atmosphere sizzles with archived Epicurean delights
Later laid out on polished wares and delivered with smiles.

Porcine parades seldom disdain the rather pristine scenery
Trumps of grunts and honks announcing the sour invasion.
Earthmoving quadrupeds burrow into defeated garbage cans
Fertilizing the macadam with spaghetti strands, rotten waste…

A vanguard of local warlords perch at community’s portal.
They scavenge the scene for intruders with blood-shot eyes
And flay vagabonds with tongues corroded with intoxicants.
Bandits are rapped, ripped, striped, stripped and serenaded.













Chukuemeka Akpe
June 2006©