Fading Cloud
The morning is a cloud
Overshadowing the gloom of night’s dark.
The morning is a growing tree
Spreading fearless
wings.
The morning dew
Washes gales of intense sorrow.
Pour libations on dry grounds
To awaken dead spirits.
The morning bares cleavages of hope
At intersections where the dots
No longer connect.
When the morning bleeds tears,
Blurry fogs blind lucid dreams.
Worship the morning’s dawn
To break the chain of mourning
Before we become a vanishing cloud.
The Morning Cloud
The morning’s clouds are as fresh
as the morning dew
before pollution left a ruinous mark
on its unsullied record.
Can’t you see the smoke billows
blighting its innocence?
The government’s laxity is cold
and searing.
Our farmlands bear testament
to our distressing wails;
a once-virgin land, clothed in innocence
before we soiled its green
and apathy became second nature.
The earth is in agony
and our actions are empty
like the morning’s clouds.
Prayer for Clemency
The superintendent hangs boots made of sloths
On God’s neck,
Shrinking from troubles
Here and there.
Say, only God can swallow the floods
And drink this sweeping storm
That has weathered our greens,
Etching misery along the way
Climate changes its spots
Leaving footprints of woes
And the superintendent, with hands of clay,
puts his stakes on God.
A man is building blocks of confidence
With no works: fortresses in the wind.
The rainstorms have left us washed
And at the mercy of raging waters.
Photo by Nathalia Segato on Unsplash
Bio:
Tolu’ A. Akinyemi (also known as Tolutoludo & the Lion of Newcastle) is a multiple award-winning author in the genres of poetry, short stories, children’s literature, and essays.
His works include Dead Lions Don’t Roar (poetry, 2017); Unravel Your Hidden Gems (essays, 2018); Dead Dogs Don’t Bark (poetry, 2018); Dead Cats Don’t Meow (poetry, 2019); Never Play Games With the Devil (poetry, 2019); Inferno of Silence (short stories, 2020); A Booktiful Love (poetry, 2020); Black ≠ Inferior (poetry, 2021); Never Marry a Writer (poetry, 2021); Everybody Don Kolomental (poetry, 2021); I Wear Self-Confidence Like a Second Skin (children’s literature, 2021); I Am Not a Troublemaker (children’s literature, 2021); Born in Lockdown (poetry, 2021); A god in a Human Body (poetry, 2022); If You Have To Be Anything, Be Kind (children’s literature, 2022); City of Lost Memories, (poetry, 2022); Awaken Your Inner Lion, (essays, 2022); On The Train To Hell, (poetry, 2022); You Need More Than Dreams (poetry, 2023); and The Morning Cloud is Empty (poetry, 2023).
He is a co-founder of Lion and Lilac, a UK-based arts organisation, and sits on the board of many organisations.