Aksum . . .

December 17 was the last date when I had posted on my blog . . . I have truly missed being here . . . so, here I am with the first entry of 2018 (Happy New Year, by the by) . . . my three poems that will appear in the January, 2018 issue of The Year of the Poet V, an anthology published by the globe-reaching Inner Child Press (monthly poetry offerings of the Poetry Posse and between 3-4 featured new poets). Entering 2018 strong in its 5th year, this publication will provide the reader with insights into a different cultural entity across the world in each of its issues. January’s focus was Aksum.

what i knew would simply not do

Ethiopia
the early Christian era
but Red Sea ruler?

~ ~ ~

empires surely rise

and
as we live it every day today
they also fall
out of history’s authentic tracks, that is
for only white men get to etch make-believe memories
in acid on the indestructible fabric of lies to come
together, of course, with co-travelers –their women
who in the footsteps of
their 19^th century Orientalist counterparts
first become enchanted
(or better yet drunken)
by the foreign “object” of their own fantasies
but then upon their return to their home countries
adhere themselves in perfected loyalty to
painting, writing or chanting
pieces of fascinating stories
all of which serve to mesmerize
the self-appointed ”Subject”
of highest esteem in its collective existence

the “other” is doomed . . .
doomed beyond erasure
far beyond the abyss
of eternity

history’s selective books
again and again, as our times evidence anew,
mount permanently
those powers of self-erected “superior” thrones
in their self-designated importance
for generations and more and more generations to come
on self-constructed paper reserved for mass readings
however fast their seats’ physical capacity
may outgrow their miniscule competence
failing to make room for their incurable ignorance . . .

The Aksum Kingdom too is doomed
doomed to remain as “the inferior other”
not to be ever revered for
what it had in fact been, was and will be
namely, a domain of notable accomplishment
among our current world’s celebrated civilizations
worthy of equally noble presentations
as well as proud representations

it is doomed instead

if only this empire had not been discovered
to be an achievement of blacks
created as a “promised land for uprooted Africans”

if only this empire had not been revived
for its utterly memorable existence
through the efforts of enslaved
18^th century black preachers
amid us

in the good old United States . . .

~ ~ ~

what is to be your mark?

Aksum’s origin
is not to be traced back to
Semitic kingdoms