FAMOUS BOYISH SMILE
©Cyrus Dali Vesuvala

Did you ever think just what you cost her?
Or, were you only having your fun?
Now you know that you’d already lost her
When you thought you’d just begun...

You wooed her with your innocence,
You wooed her with your style,
You wooed her with the freshness of
Your famous boyish smile-
You stripped her of her self-respect,
You stripped her of her shame
And, to strip her of her everything's
The essence of your game…

brown stains on freshly-mowed grass
death comes mourning,
to others
the gift of light receding
earth-roots tapping
less the water

replicating patterns of beauty
in near-death experiences
we hold what is dear close to old visions
scattering prisms of hope
and hope
love will find a way.

There's something that is a really changing
and that, can also heal a broken heart,

some days, it's a moving tediously slow
other days, it'll tell you, you can't start.

Seems like folks are always running out of it
and, there's even an iced cold, Miller one,

it folds, and melds into some sort, of a kind of a table
yet, had to create different zones so we could get things done.

It's only but an increment of measure
but claims, all along to be on your side;

There is a breathlessness upon this shore
at dawn, gold sand whispering with rush of water
before the breeze becomes a wind,
and people start to stain the land.

In all the moments of my life,
each second fractured into infinite new parts,
the only other place I feel so timeless,
so encompassing, is in your arms.

Where blue water reaches up from depth
to touch my skin, I feel your thigh
pressed close on mine, as warm as risen sun
splintered into shards by gentle waves.

We walked into the darkness
Blinding the bestowed gift

People fell before our sides
And yet, cold blood is what it was

Only the wretched hope
Laid within our bloody grasp

The once ideal promise
Captivated our fragile hearts

Nevertheless, all decays
Into that tale told in the past

Life leaks its own hidden wounds
Never knowing if we’ll return

A good man,
a kindly man,
a good neighbour.

He's been a drover and a banker,
imagine that!
The stories he can tell,
of aborigines singing the cattle to sleep at night,
of his bush mates
singing and telling their ballads by firelight.

I showed him my poem
"Time goes round in a straight line"

You are absolutely right,
The soldier’s plight
After they fight,
They are left out
In the twilight

Suddenly,
Even out of politician’s sight
Because might is right,
And
The soldier isn't able
To exercise his voice.

Our Arts teacher, humble and kind
Married a young beautiful wife
On Sunday, sixteenth September
The year of our Lord, the son

He arranged a visit to the in-laws
To show appreciation and joy
He soaked cassava tubers for six days
And on the seventh, he cleaned them up

The cassava water smelled so bad
The offensive odour was nothing to him
As he cooked and pounded the fufu
Then wrapped it with large plantain leaves

Where Elephants Go to Die

in forests dense and dark
there are places
mysterious
where elephants go
to die alone
for alone is how dying is done.
they never know fear
pass on and mourn their dead
in quiet acquiescence

in a forest deep and dark
of my Mind's invention
something of me is hdden
blind to the fear of ending.
it knows its way to that special place
and waits
in quiet acquiescence

Look around,
You've come of age.
Emotions spiral inside.

You've felt this before
but you can't,
you won't remember.

The feeling of being lost,
inadquate, inaccessible.
Fear wells up inside.

They walk on by,
They come and go,
and always, so do you.

A crumpled piece of paper,
on the side of the road
covered in muck.

But not this time,
I will not be left behind.
I will be loved.