Kalypsoul: The Other Self: January 2005

Saturday, January 29, 2005

A Fiery Dawn

I look at you and I feel
a sudden
overwhelming
rush of love
a flooding swell of tender emotion
deep within my being
making me weak
yet strong
filling me with its power

You are . . .
the blazing brilliance of the noonday sun
shining full upon my face

You are . . .
the poignant lingering glory
of the majestic setting sun
the glowing fullness
of the rising morn

You are . . .
every twinkling star
that weaves its magic
in my midnight sky

You are
the solitary tear
the gem that gleams
in the eyes
of my darkest emotion

You are . ..
the cooling touch
that caresses and soothes
yet sears
the very depths of my soul
making . . .
my flesh to burn
and . . .
my blood to run diffuse

Silently . . .
you crept into my life
and awakened my dormant heart
with a kiss
with a touch
with a word
with a mere glance . . .

awakened my sleeping heart
to the fiery dawning
of your love . . .

You . . .
have taught me how
to live again

To You . . .
I give . . .
my life . . .
my love . . .
my all
. . .
who came unawares
into my life
and made it
. . .
a poetic existence
a wonderful experience
. . .
© KPLewis (Kalypsoul)
1999

Thursday, January 27, 2005

At Aburi Photo

At Aburi, 2001.

At Elmina Photo

At Elmina Castle, 2001

Recluse

Annoyance
Bubbles unexpectedly
Schizophrenia, OCD
Childish dependency
Hagiolatry
Churlish roguery
Everybody gets to me

Impatience
Threatens like an irate sea
Anger boils vehemently
Bristling at infidelity
Lethargy
Wanton sensuality
Everything is bane to me

Avoidance
Kills humanity
Buried sensibility
Living bestiality
Insanity
Ancient antipathy
Outcast from society

Left alone just to be
Me
Willingly

© KPLewis (Kalypsoul)
12.28.2004

Velvet

Exquisite feel of me n you
Shedding both a tear or two
Rubbing beaks like budgies do
Rich-textured powdery hue
Downy swirls of blossom blue
And velvety, too!

Silent touch and satiny
Like warm cups of saki tea
Sheer fluidity
Plush, soft, and cushiony
love-deep in Ebon Ecstasy
And Oh so velvety!

In our togetherness I see
Sultry, sassy, cascading beauty
Nestled softly in a tender sigh
A kiss, a blush, a smiling eye
The wonder that is you n I
Never needs a reason why

©KPLewis (Kalypsoul)
1999

Empty Nest

Toothbrush and paste
Contacts and case
This and that discarded in haste

Handsome grad in cap and gown
Do rag, bling, waist half way down
Enough no more stop foolin ‘round

Password ready on the Dell
How long ago . . .it’s hard to tell
Now silence rings the loudest bell

The chubby babe of yesterday
At college dorm room miles away
Never coming back to stay

An empty room . . . an empty bed
All aglow in disco red
What was it ‘The Prophet’ said?

He’s the arrow
I’m the bow?
Yet the hardest thing is letting go

©KPLewis (Kalypsoul)
September, 2004

It Has Come

It has come
Another 365 have turned tail and run
Accomplishing so much and yet
Nothing ever seems to change
We stand trembling
Looking over the threshold
Into tomorrow
Thinking of . . .

Yesterday
We met and smiled and kissed
And touched so gingerly
Afraid it would melt away
And yesterday fused our memories
Into one tremulous heart
Yesterday we laughed
And thought nothing of today

Then it came . . .
The Terror
Thunder
Tornado
Typhoon
Tsunami
Hu-ra-can
Laughter, Lupus and Leukemia
Praying for . . .

Today. . .
We put our plans into play
Loving some, losing some
Changing directions
Sometimes
Stepping cautiously into
Eddying whirlpool
Of roller coaster rides
Pausing to catch a breath
Wandering off into
The great out yonder
Creating spaces large and small
Dropping a stitch or two
Saying farewell to you
And once again
‘I do’
Wondering about. . .

Tomorrow. . .
It has come at last
Bring out the bubbly
Streamers, confetti
Noisemakers
Resolutions
Of a great revolution
To come
Within and without
Embrace tomorrow yet
Forget not yesterday
Accept today
All march in unending stream
Of consciousness seared
With lessons learned
Burned in memory and regret
Yet doing it all again

Just as if. . .
We had no yesterday
And never any today
Tomorrow becomes today
And today yesterday
365 or 360?

© KP Lewis (Kalypsoul)
12.28.2004

Eyes Shut Tight

Haven’t you noticed. . .
You love neither deeply nor too well
Better from afar than near
Getting more than giving
Sight unseeing than unseen
Fetters loose than shackles clanging
Eyes shut tight than ope wide and aware
Surface deep not layers peeled
Ever astir than still, calm and at peace?

Have you ever noticed how. . .
You love me best when not alone
Behoves you more to let them see
Grand entrance and a flashy show
Choose rather to please the people’s eye
Speak of your love than show not tell
Collect awards for heart and soul
Give kisses, coins and smiles away
None ever left for hearth and home?

Have you ever noticed, dear. . .
How little I, too, have come to care?
Open those eyes; see soul stripped bare
Your own cold heart reflected there

© KPLewis (Kalypsoul)
12.28.2004

Cruisin'

(Dedicated to: The Children of the Sea)

Cruisin'

Pinnacle
Of icy pageantry
Icicle
Of regal majesty
Spectacle
Of raucous revelry
Elegance!
Chandeliers of frosty opulence
Slake and sever and slice through frothy decadence

Cruisin above; crew’s inn below
when boilers cease to churn
In torrents now of angry flow
Torn, rent from bow to stern
the rich, the famous and the low
hard lesson now to learn

Mangled bones of captives lost,
chained raw in blood and rust
From sugar’d gold and putrid hold
to shark-infested lust
Rest In Peace O wretched fold
In everlasting trust

‘Neath ocean vast, the die is cast
Equal and free at last!

© KPLewis (Kalypsoul)
01.12.2005

Ferris Wheel

Soul deep whisperings
sad silent voice
low steep echoing moan
jarring rough against
jagged edges of pain
nerves exposed
raw and ragged
awakened sensitive
to your pluck and strum
your whims and fancies
your slumps and booms
your ebbs and flows
your comings and goings
your laughing and crying
your ups and downs
your pros and cons
blowing hot and cold
weaving in and out
riding high and low
switching on and off
to-ing and fro-ing
now and then
here and there
later not sooner
after not before
swinging back and forth
your pendulums of concern
flickers of caring
of passion
of love you say
or was it of compassion
or empathy
or consideration
turned quickly to self adulation
grasping, seeking
expert juggling
fingers cleverly working
spindles of intricate design
quilts
mosaics
murals
cosmograms
woven ware
woollens
Persian rugs
fanciwork and pretty things
crotchet symphonies
missed beats and threads unravelled
dropped stitches now and then
more now than then
and then again
and again
cascading water slide
exhilarating roller coaster ride
swooshing up to heaven
nosediving down to hell
fascinating ferris wheel
falling head over heel
nauseating
belly up
inside out, up and down, and churning around
ripping to shreds
tender emotions
fashioned carved and nurtured
in purity
in childlike simplicity
still trusting implicitly
bottoming out
aimlessly
into eternity
irretreivable
irreconcilable
inexplicable
unexplained and unexplaining
left alone wondering
whatever happened
to what
you say
we say
once was?
Lost forever in
black hole of anguish
spinning directionless
out there somewhere
in heartless abundance of space
dark abyssmal nothingness
eternal void
spawned and flung afar
from ferris wheel
of your unwilling
absence

© KP Lewis (Kalypsoul)
2004

Demon Seed

To: Innocent child of rape

Demon Seed

Innocent Child Born of Rape

Two warring souls revive the scene of Eden’s paradise!
Mars and Venus rivalry, a violator’s heist

‘Twas the heady exhilaration of power’s lure methinks
loss of sensibility to animal instincts

Neither silent cries, nor pleas of love, nor sentiments hold sway
when coarse passions of the wicked, allowed to rule the day

No lover's kiss, no tender sigh, no time for pleasantry
a mutual joy must now submit to bestiality.

No ice-cream swirl, no velvet red, no chocolate-sprinkled dips
just vengeance vindication, come spewing from the hips

A million wee demoniacs swim upstream with intent
like leeches to immobile prey, your loins’ malevolence

Rampaging rigidity, contemptuous to the nth
the apple won, serpentine lust, your avarice lies spent

Dignity long since denied, her purity assailed
forever she must pay the price in weeping and travail

Yet chooses she to spare the life of demon’s infant fruit
And end the chain of violence so treasured by the brute

A season’s early ripening is born to sunlight air
Cleansed by mother’s tender love, and made whole by her tears

So swim on, little demon seed, like mullet in the stream
break free of every evil weed, rebuild your mother’s dream.

© KP Lewis (Kalypsoul)
2004

Renewal

(To My long lost love - Redisovered)

Renewal
Part II

Renew myself somehow today.
mirror mirror . . . truth I say

Peel back layers of endless fears
cruel time, and trial and tears.

See the other side of I
nestled warm on trembling sigh

Lush and verdant green the glade
once no chirping serenade

Yet now joy, love, peace and hope
flow free in this kaleidoscope

Splintered shards of eons past
come to touch deep core at last

Gently, softly, tenderly
who could have guessed the breadth of Me

Sweet innocent immensity
fly far with possibility

Gath'ring each frayed puzzle piece
quiver settle and then cease

Hidden petals now unfurl
heal my body cleanse my soul

rise up with breath of brand new life
cast behind all stress and strife

face brave future with a smile
hold head high my inner child

© KPLewis (Kalypsoul)
12.20.2004

The Way I Use Language

Author’s Note: Codeflow

You will find that I have started to experiment with movement in communication referencing (in speech and thought patterns) from dialect to standard that is neither unidirectional nor formulaic. This is deliberate. The style used here is my experimentation with what I call code-flow. I find myself writing the way I speak – in a comfortable, fluid mixture of standard and dialect, often within the same sentence, the same thought. It is what we Caribbean people do in uncontrived everyday speech. It is not code-shifting with which the literary world is familiar. Code-switching or code- shifting tends to follow a certain pattern, dialect for speech and standard for description and narration as has been traditionally used in Caribbean fiction. I am taking it a step further, letting dialect flow into standard and back again in both dialogue and narration/description, mingling together in the same sentence, the same thought. To me this shows the true fluidity/reality of how we operate linguistically in everyday life. We do not think in standard English and converse in Trini dialect; we think in both and speak in both but not all the same time. I may begin a thought in the standard received form but suddenly I want to express surprise, hilarity, indignation, outrage and the standard does not have the right words. I flow effortlessly to that in which I can express those thought, those ideas, those sentiments most comfortably. I express them and, depending on what I wish to reference next, I either move back to standard, stay where I am or move deeper into another dialect comfort zone. I may say it in French Patois or Cocoa Panyol or a dialect of Hindi or of English or I may use a uniquely West African turn of phrase or grammatical construct or express m thoughts in a totally creative word or expression known only to my country or one group or individual within. Language gets created through use and new words and expressions all have a very specific starting point.

Code switching is an improvement on the outright rejection of the use of dialect as having no place in the written word or in Caribbean literature. It also differs from the outright rejection of the standard as a form of linguistic resistance to colonialism. Yet, code switching is a colonized, conformist mode that, in spite of itself, accepts the superiority of the standard and makes apologies for dialect by restricting its use only to direct speech. It reflects the pedagogy of colonial education which polarized the acceptable standard of the reading books and the classroom from the unacceptable dialect of everyday use by everyday people. It was a time when the whip was applied to purge the tendency towards dialect use in respectable settings.

Code sliding attempts a more integral blending of the two and brings together a variety of Caribbean dialects in one form. It moves in the direction of defining a distinct and decolonized Caribbean identity in the aftermath of colonialism. The term code-sliding, however, implies for me a lack of control, a downward sort of slippery slope movement, and a built-in acceptance of linguistic hierarchies. Instead I advance the concept of code-flow which conveys the sense of non-hierarchical fluidity and an effortlessness that defines acceptance of a unique identity in the context of postmodernity rather than deliberate conscious resistance in the context of coloniality or postcoloniality. It speaks of creativity, reinterpretation and transformation. The smooth fluidity of language that melds the standard with dialect in a thought, in a phrase, in a sentence, shows not so much a rejection of historic influences but an acceptance of the new self, the birth of a Caribbean identity in which colonialism and an ethos defined by resistance to it are merely blurred distant memories. Caribbean code-flow essentially involves and emerges from an unequivocal acceptance of all aspects of a new self: Africa, Europe, India and Mesoamerica, all integral to the new identity through reinterpretation and transformation. It is méstissajé, creolité, unrepentant.