I'm not sure how this works
Out, you and me,
All twiddling thumbs and
Awkward hair twirls unsure
How to properly
Spit
Out a greeting,

"Oh hello."

And what comes after,
And what should come after.

We try our best to
Veer away from each other,
Afraid that the other would
Smell the
Rancid blue cheeses on
Our tongue,

Or the cliches displayed for all to see,
Like spinach in our teeth.

So we nod.

Slowly.

Abruptly.

With chin up and hair
Tangled somewhere behind
Our ears,
Hopefully.

And ice breakers stale
In the backs
Of our jeans pockets.

Noses crinkling in
Silent prayer as to
Never have to ask the person

"Sooo, how's the weather" or

"Sooo, how much does a polar bear weigh?"

(Enough to break the ice, by the way.)

American kids
Drive Japanese cars
With loud cranking music
30 Seconds to Mars

Wear Italian designer
Hipster blue jeans
All apart of
The American scene

With the sporting of tats
Bring on the change
Imagine that
They now all look the same

American kids
Frequent Sushi bars
With piped in top forty
From English pop stars

Spending minimum wage
On German beer
Names they can't pronounce
Cause they're not from here

Try as they might
Can't point on the map
Where they have been
Nor where they are at

American kids
You can't understand
Because they are
American kids

It starts
with a warmth, like
fingers spreading thick in my belly
slowly making its way up, up, up
tickling my throat and
warming every inch of this body until
there’s nothing I can do to stop
my lips from parting
my hands from raising
my feet from dancing

How beautiful You are.

Joy.
I feel it radiate, it seems to
vibrate from a well that’s deeper
than I’ve ever known
leaving me without words
and when I find them, they
dance.
The words
dance.
And I feel fire.
My heart swells,
and my bones breathe.
So this
is what it means
to be in love.
And I am so
in love.

How beautiful You are.

Here
I
am.
Walls torn down
pride crumbling
dry and broken
but I know
You’ll still draw me in, so here
I am
standing stunned at…
How do I begin to describe You?
You
whose lips burst forth light
and carved out mountains with precision
set the earth’s cornerstone in position
shut snowstorms in their storehouses
fastened galaxies in their places
You who
breathed out
morning stars.

How beautiful You are.

The sun sets, sinking
in colors of warm honey and
tangerine
I feel You smiling down
on me, and You whisper,
“Child, this one’s for you.”

How beautiful You are.

And my mind just can’t wrap itself around You
and how You
command the clouds to roll like the sea
guiding lightning as it strikes soft earth
and how You
are so much bigger
than I could ever understand
but still are mindful
of man, how
great You are in
perfect faithfulness.

There is no end
to Your love, and if I
were to live and die
a thousand times, and if
the heavens fell
and the seas swallowed up the earth
and the sun stopped rising in the east
and the birds ceased their morning songs
still Your love would
endure
And Your grace
which goes beyond my shame,
I’ve run out of similes and metaphors
to describe how vast
and amazing is this grace
You have that never seems to
run dry no matter how far I run
no matter how hard I fall
no matter how stone-like my heart’s become
Your grace carries me
telling me I’m still Yours.
And I
am forever Yours.

How beautiful You are.

Savior,
Your heart bled at the sight of us
longing for a way to close the gap
millenniums of our pitiful good works
couldn’t close.
Merciful,
in promising to never again
wipe out the face of the earth despite our
stubborn souls sinning the same sins,
saying sorry while we slipped
blood money into our back pockets, we
don’t
deserve
anything.
Yet You
gave
Your
everything.

Overcomer,
Death itself couldn’t keep You prisoner
I still can’t imagine how
Someone like You would
willingly lay His life down
for someone
like me, and I fall to my knees
remembering how
on the cross You
crucified my sins
in the grave You
buried my past
at last
we are free
we are redeemed
we are Your children,
chosen and forgiven
waiting until You
come again.

And if I come to You
before You come to me
and I’ll be running
finally
straight into Your arms,
I don’t know if I’ll even have the
breath to say,

“How beautiful
You are.”

A final inhalation, farewell to oxygen
submitting to oblivion
a conscious lack of everything.
The very absence of air, sickening and
desolate, destitute, despairing
tearing at my aching lungs,
my vacant mind.
Call me a vagabond, a wanderer
entrapped in the extrasensory.

My breath escapes. 

The empty core within myself rings in tune with the extant and extinct.
Neck arching, mouth agape
a single note transcends my lips of stone
unadulterated, unwavering, a melodious sound 
building and joining in harmony to create a symphony of
life, of
death, of
everything we cannot comprehend. 
Sonorous and assonant
my soul cries out
at ever-growing volumes.
My eyes begin to flicker and fade away.

God, can You hear my screams in space
in this vacuum, void of sound?

she said,
"don't grow up,"
and i replied,
"my darling,
it's a bit too late for that.
the fun and games
have ended.
the curtains
are closing.
the adrenaline
is fading.
the smiles
are dying.
the hearts
are breaking.
and i feel
i have lived
a thousand lifetimes,
each one lacking
a childhood."

(a.m.)

Maybe it was the
Fated curl of a clouds lips
That blew wind
At the precise moment
On the ragged sail
And pushed this vessel
To the raging seas,
Towards stormy nights,
And took me
Exactly
Where I needed to go.

Despite the odds,
This broken boat,
Cracks and crevasses,
Made it's way to You.

O see the Clock as it clicks
And even eyes does its blinks
But time they say will tell
When each leaves shall fall
To all human time is essence
So essential a priceless assest

Unlike dreams that we share
Unlike fairy tales we hear
Our destiny is what is fated
So unlike to be changed
Both good and bad is made

To all soul is a time frame
Each one speeding between the time lag
Live your life by the roll of time
So your life won't be lame
Rise and shine when you can
So you won't leave out of kinds

Truly not all fairy tales come true
Not all dreams are,can be assure
But destiny is underpinning
Even if it not what you are demanding
Your destiny was what is given
With a fair cry it must be taken

When others watch a boat sailing
You watch what the time says
Destiny!! a gift of pride bethrowed
Which no human in life can withhold

OH! My destiny hope it is what I can behold


Written by: Temitope Olayinka M

I'd love to be the harbor boat
That gently tugs, keeping you afloat
Or perhaps even better yet
The soft comfort of your unmade bed

I'd love to be the garden trowel
The one you use when you plant spring flowers
Or perhaps even better still
The lucky coin in your wishing well

I'd love to be the big red barn
With stacks of hay inside to keep you warm
Or perhaps even more than that
The loving purr from you favorite cat

I'd love to be your private Learjet
To take you places that you've never been
Or perhaps given half a chance
The diamond ring slipped on your left hand

I'd love to be your automobile
The comfort you feel from behind the wheel
Or perhaps to tell the truth
I'd love to be all this and more for you