Thursday, May 23, 2013

A Poem for Dreamers




       A Poem for Dreamers
Written by ShyPoet1

    You lean into my eyes and you see rivers
Old rivers that stagnate in the past
Their fingers touch floors of this world
And wrap around the Blackness of my skin
Muddy, long, wet rivers
Like my 'peoples' path
And they flow everywhere

    In the deep brown scars in my eyes
You see how things used to be ...
Pyramids
And chains
And master mentality arrangements ...
Rigged hard like hot cotton fields
And you hope they never change
You see what you were told to see,
But, I, only wanted you to see me

   Now I talk to rivers
And the rivers talk back to me
They linger like dreams
And spread their life to everywhere
Like my 'peoples'
Even on the shores of a defeatist society ...

   Now I walk in deserts
Deserts of broken hopes and dreams
They seem to be everywhere ...
Black and White and blue ... - Yellow too
Now I see deserts of my people
But, I'm left wondering if ...
They truly see themselves?
As these old rivers, and truth, dry up to dust ....

   So many rivers have flowed through us
In bright and lustrous hearts
Poets remind us of what we can still be,
Maya
Langston
Malcolm X and Martin too ...
And many new Poets flew ...

   No, not like raisons dying in the sun
No, not like servants and lesser things
No, not like inferiors and a doomed beings ...
But, like Captains and Presidents
Soon we'll be Saints and Saviors too ...
And all American heroes for you ...

   Dreamers and cloud walkers
My 'peoples', my hopes
-- All walked inside the dream
They made dreams reality;
In the highlands and the low lands
The rivers flowed ...

   In dark darkness and smooth light
Like my 'peoples'
Each one of them, will love you too ...
And someday, the rivers
Like my 'peoples'
Shall flow again
Great the vision and dreams
Wise the rivers flow ...

1 comment:

  1. It is strange how this poem echoes Langston Hughes "I've Known Rivers" poem. Yet it has a fuller understanding and explanation of exactly what the rivers may represent. It expands upon the concept of waters flowing through and nourishing our lives and that of our progeny. This poem takes a step further the purposes of even desserts, visions and dreams. I especially like the encouraging line of "Poets remind us of what we can be. . ." And the lives of several of our leaders are assessed as poetry too. So this poet brings the original Rivers poem full circle and back again. But it does not copy yet elaborates. I can respect that. What do you see in poetry of this type?

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