Monthly Archives

August 2018

Aloud

LIVE FOR THE NOW-By- Odirionye Chiagoziem

by Eden Benibo

Words to live by:

Look not back on yesterday
or what you have left behind,
For only today is yours to claim
and this moment only is your time.

Fret not on what has been
or on what has passed you by
Yesterday is far behind you,
You can’t change it if you try.

New opportunities await you
They come with each new day,
so look ahead with faith and hope
and blessings will come your way.

Keep faith alive in your heart
Live full and live well each day
Do all the good for all you can,
to all those who pass your way.

Yesterday is out of your reach
and tomorrow is not yours to claim
Only this moment belongs to you,
So use it wisely, in Jesus’ name.

Amen.

About The Author: Today, we bring to you a multi talented individual, fortified with an unwavering will and zeal to thrive beyond all odds.
Odirionye Chiagoziem is currently a 300 level law student of the University of Uyo. He is a music producer, poet, ardent writer, graphics designer and website developer.
Chiagoziem is passionate about making a positive indelible trademark on planet Earth.
#mindset #legend
We look forward to seeing him glow brighter in his versatility!

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Aloud

Save The Girls – By- DERIOTEIDOR KENNETH 

by Eden Benibo
Our Sister, your sister,
a turmoil-unhealed tumor,
Born home, made street
yet street chase after their lives;
Below gantry they  seek shade.
Our unborn progeny mothers
Raped and murdered like ants,
You took advantage of their purity;
Even carved them to sex-machine.
Save the girls
Your sister, mine sister,draw her close;
Offer unto them hope not hopelessness.
Save the girls
Provide to them roof not rooflessness
Tell them, they are the mothers for….@ DK (DERIOTEIDOR KENNETH)

 
 
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AloudUncategorized

Nights the universe drown us in ourselves-By- Olabisi Abiodun Akinwale

by Eden Benibo

Nights like this, we are strange creatures
Created after a god- fading into a whisper;
.
We sit by our mother’s windows
Wearing a colourless skin on a body
Defiled by silence, emptiness & paleness
Waiting for a known face, hand & voice
To reach for the music in our hearts & the memories
Skating our shadows on the surface of hell.
.
We carve our faces out of the earth
On a sheet as blank as our brother’s smile
& the laughter on our sister’s face
Carrying portraits of men who invented
The word ‘abuse’ for everything in skirts.
On this part, nothing is fair, not even in love & war.
.
We bear the images of how the universe
Sip light from the veins of boys like us
Learning to throw themselves to dark songs.
When life suspends your being by the thread of depression
You stretch into unsafe places in your body
To see what it really means to be a god in ungodly times.
.
Our souls stand beneath burning trees
With tales potent enough to keep the living asleep
Tales always begging reality to hold her temper
& grip from girls wrestling with their own beauty & endowment.
Deep in our hearts, we believe in God’s existence
But, we do not know why our efforts to find him are always futile.
.
Our cries are gardens of burnt flowers
& of weeds, growing on incinerated skins.
We let the wind fill our bodies with strange songs
& poems, weighing the world on a dirge-scale.
There are battles on our insides
& too many boys have died with diamonds in their hearts.
.
Our silence grows into something
Without a head, a form or being
For our voices are aliens to the earth
& to everyone not created in our image & likeness.
Maybe we’re never made to be beautiful
Or to be free like the wind, from ourselves.
.
Sometimes, the only things worth holding unto
Are end products of depression- though, they are broader ways to death.
.
© Olabisi Abiodun Akinwale

•••••~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~•••••

More than ever before, beyond those happy faces we see around lies a soul slowly drowning in the sea of depression. Some for reasons inexplicable, others may be due to the overwhelmingness of life’s hurdle. Depression can be a state of stagnancy, where everything may just feel meaningless at some point.
Ever experienced this? Perhaps gratefully you’re past this phase already?
Or maybe, just maybe you’re currently going through something similar.
Please do not remain within the confinement of that shell, reach out today @[email protected] and let’s rub minds together and see how we could bring you back to you again!
Also if you have any similar life experience you’ll like to share to anyone going through what you scaled through, do not hesitate to forward via the same email above.
Do have a most fulfilling day ahead!! Much love!
–
Eden Benibo

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EXPRESS~SHUN

Grace, After all -By- Daniele Bergamini

by Eden Benibo

I am Christian: which means I am blessed by having received the revelation that God has been suffering with me, and dying for me, so to open the Gates of Heaven for my whole being.

I am physically disabled, for a lifetime: which means that I experience within my bones and flesh, and, more subtly, in a number of aspects of my life, the mystery of the purpose of our pain, and the challenge of, at once, accepting what can’t be changed, yet believing that God can help me overcome any obstacle, if I only dare to spread my sails to a wind I should know has been there all the time, even if at times, for my faith is weak, I’m not always able to feel it.

And I have been blessed by God for He gracefully and lovingly let me open my heart and mind to an adamant truth: that my lifetime disability is a blessing in disguise, for it’s a portentous chance to give and take love, and a chance and reminder to dig within, there were the greatest (and solely true) treasures I will ever own can be found.

It’s challenging, at times, to remind myself to consider my difficulties as potential sources of blessings or incentives to improve myself and explore the dark side of pain, which paradoxically is fecund of light. And so it can happen to me, from a path scattered with holes and pointy rocks, to look at Jesus Christ, at his heavy, aching progression through His Calvary, and to end telling myself, with resignation, as if it there was nothing else: ‘Look, that’s the way God took for first, to lead us: the way of suffering’.

Like if the unavoidable pain of this human condition had to necessarily prevail, and even God was subjected to it.

Now, I’m not going to state that, oppositely, we can avoid it all, as our times of test are as much necessary as it is, for the ugly, crawling caterpillar, to first stay in, entrapped, and then dig through, the chrysalis, so to become a wondrous, flying butterfly: we need to suffer, from time to time, for to need and therefore, hopefully, discover that dormant force within us.

But what about the infinite grace, sprouting from the Calvary and Death of Jesus like a tender green plant from a hardened seed buried in the frozen ground?

What I should always remind myself, in first place, is that, once reached the Golgotha and having fulfilled the purpose of His passion, Jesus Christ died for to take on Himself all of our miseries, for to nullify them by means of His love which is infinitely greater than them all, and, finally, for to transmute them into Salvation by His Glorious Resurrection!

What I’m reminding to myself – and to you -, right now, is that, even if we can’t avoid each single pain we’re supposed to go through, for it’s necessary in order to learn, progress and improve ourselves, like steel forged into the scorching fire, even if the suffering Christ is the most perfect Role Model for us to try to imitate the best we can, there’s an infinite Love, God’s, birthing Grace, which already payed the price for us, once and for all, an infinite Love whose broken, overflowing dams let its content rain on us, if only we don’t forget and don’t refuse to ask for it and to receive it, no matter all the pain and sorrow we’re meant to go through, at a certain time…

So, are the hands of our heart, mind, soul moving towards that ever-pouring, and ever-flowing spring of nectar of Grace?

Look, it’s right here, within our reach.
And it’s free, and abundant.
Just ask, and accept.

(c) Daniele Bergamini @danbergam
————————–
About The Author:

Today we present to you a blessed heart, who has thrived beyond the storms of life to become a rainbow and sunshine in the lives of many.

Daniele Bergamini was born in 1972 in Italy, where he lives, loves, creates.
Physically disabled, he defines his condition “a weird blessing”.
He believes in Jesus, loves life, has plenty of interests for a lifetime or two (writing being one of them), and in 2017 he published his first book, a poetry collection titled “Chants for Love” (available as paperback on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Book Repository and as Kindle e-book as well).
He can be found in the Web (Instagram included, where so many of his writings are posted) as danbergam.

Keep Glowing Daniele! Much love!!

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Articles

For The Girl Child- By- Collette Obi

by Eden Benibo

A note to any girl or woman who is yet to understand her self worth, listen up girl, your worth is impossible to measure!. This is our story marred with experiences.
She came to him tainted and confused with lots of secrets, never knowing HE watched her all her life,and like a cinema heaven watched her waiting for her to manifest and yearning for her heart.He craved her attention long before she came to the realization that HE exist.She came to mother earth roaming but not living never knowing her worth,never coming to the realisation of what HE did for her.Like the lover that HE is,HE gave up everything for her bearing in mind that she would hurt him in the future.Day after day, she grew farther from him,not knowing HE sheds tears on her behalf daily. She is happy and HE is weeping,for her soul and the value which HE placed on her. She never knew she was blood born, she never knew she was part of the blood gang.HIS blood gang.
Dear girl child,value yourself.
Yes there are times when we ask ourselves why we had to come out as a girl child rather than a boy,or why the freedom given to us is less than that of the boy? We oftentimes get tired of the reprimanding looks from parents when we fail to comport ourselves or ooze the so called “ladylike aura”,always starving ourselves in the name of getting those approved words and denying ourselves the opportunity of letting loose,doing that which gives us pleasure and limiting ourselves to suit the tents of the society.Does it always have to be in the ride of our bosom or the arch of our backs?
This is a note for that tall,slim,dark girl who thinks she is getting less than what she deserves.
A note for the timid looking girl reading this right now and pondering over giving herself a trial.
This is a note for that fair babe in a green skirt and a white blouse ,stop judging and looking down on yourself.
A note for that little child who cries herself to sleep based on what people say about her.
Dear girl child, I put this to you, value yourself. Even the Bible asserts to this, your are the modified version of man,cause out of him came you, never forget that.
We all have that day that seems so different from the rest,like the white rose admist the red.Days when we withdraw from ourselves and just decide to look at our lives from the side lines.Displaying fireworks in a single smile,portraying the joy of a mother watching her child take the very first step of his or her life or the first word of a child.Not that we don’t have our scars but it’s in the ability of thrusting the scars of life to the world with head held high for all to see.Grinning ear to ear on the fact that we got to do things without holding back eliminating the ‘what ifs’ and ‘if onlys’,never minding if people call you wierd cos that’s what we are.
Yh,Society walked up to us the other day giving that disapproving glare , her nose in the air with Perceptions trotting behind to meet up with the click click of her shoes,reminding us of how we did not fit in,shaking her heard in disgust while sizing us up,Perceptions peeped from behind her skirt smiling sheepishly and nodding her heard in agreement
Smiling and looking up at them we answered saying….Where were you when life kept hitting at us,choking the little hope left in us…..busy? The other day when we stepped out of our rooms and saw you it was as though we weren’t there,but when we finally wore the garments of rules and regulations placed at our door steps by Perceptions, you awarded us with a smile,the smile that we carried with us for years until we saw through the smile and the fake words Perceptions threw at us and when we are finally coming out from our shells dear Society, you tell us we are making a fuss.
Society not knowing what to say stared at us aghast while Perceptions just stood gawking,and with their aura of assumptions they walked out giving us no answers to our questions.
Being you and doing you for you is like a cold glass of water on a hot Sunday afternoon.You are free born,rule your world.

About the Author:    Collette Chinenye Obi is currently a student of Mass Communication in the University of Benin. Aside being a huge lover of BEANS, she is a novel addict who has a passion for touching lives through words. 

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Aloud

For Boys Like Me Who Are Writers-By- John Chizoba Vincent

by Eden Benibo

Get rejected by publishers and magazines, feel the rejections and bounce back.Get abused but never relent on it.  Let them squeeze your manuscripts for once and throw it in a waste can, yes, for once; It would make you better. Dear boys, allow a publisher to kick you out and allow your heart to cry over it,  you will feel better at the end of it all.  This is what makes you a writer. Expect anything at any time from your readers because they are your second eyes. Just be free, boys and expect the sun on you.

They will not give you a voice except the one you created yourself. They will push you to the wall in the name of critique, it is left for you to stand tall and never fall asleep with their words. If you know you know and if you will understand, you will know.  Do not be afraid. Do not be discouraged by their ancestral lies and likes.  Do not find your self a mentor because they are modern slave masters.  They will always want you to reshapen your mind to think their theirs. Forget about the cliques among the contemporary writers.  If they don’t weave your thoughts into theirs, move on  boys!  If they don’t recognise you and what you have done, move on;  boys. Every good writer started with a note of rejection.  Write until your hands ache,  write until you have nothing in your head to write again.

Create your own world,  build your own future style and don’t send heaven critics because,  they will frustrate you when you give ears to them. Try to redefine what you write for without which you would end up frustrated. There are many demons out there that will rejoice the moment you put down your pen in the name of quitting. They will laugh at you because their vedict has preveiled. Know your style, carve it out from the twisted heart of your body. Write for the soul not for likes and accolades. Write for tomorrow and not for money.  Write for the pleasure and the spirit and not, to please any one out there.

Dear boys, the only way you can be relevant in this field is to be yourself and not trying to wear another writer’s body.  Try to relate with your soul and later to the souls of your readers.  Relatively study your environments and question those things that needs to be questioned.  Be the pioneer of your thoughts. Do not plagiarized other people’s work. Do not say you are not better than yesteday. Do not say Mr. A is better than me or Mrs. B does it better than me.  By so doing,  you are killing your powess as a writer.  Learn to carve your mind and soul in books. Read a lot of poets and their poems, read a lot of books. Go research on many subjects relating to your field.  Write everything, the nature, the world,  atmosphere and the soccer and basketball and, many other things that your eyes sees.

Love doesn’t always mean stay neither does it always mean laughter and comments or accolades by those who sing vain praises. If you are a writer or a poet, just write and stop expecting those you look up to to like or comment on your works for you to know how good you are or how they see your works, it takes time for you to improve in your craft. Just write. And never get tired of writing. No one is going to  push you up there, boys. You will be pushed base on those things you have written and those recommendation will come base on those works people have read you wrote.  I will always tell you the truth and not hiding under any cover, my dear boys.

Those people you look up to started like you. There are many cliques among the so called contemporary writers of this age and,  if you are not among these cliques,  you will not be recognised among them.  Work on yourself and keep adding values everyday. If you know you are on the right track and not because your friend is a writer and you want to write also; your voice would be heard someday. Work harder, write everyday if possible.  Self training is the best way to help yourself. Stop looking up to them. Let them crave to read your next post. I will continue to speak to you through this medium until the end of the world when all has gone into abyss.

©John Chizoba Vincent
# The_Boy_Hero

 
 
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Aloud

It’s Go Time! -By- Evelyn Mercy Price

by Eden Benibo

Change your location,
and everything changes,
The Winter to Summer,
And Springtime to Fall;

Midday turns to midnight,
And morning to evening,
Latitudes, longitudes,
Time zones, and all.

Change your perspective,
And everything changes,
Coldness to hotness,
And chilly to warm;

Bitter to sweetness,
A frown to a smile,
While dark turns to lightness,
And chaos to form.

No matter what changes,
You be your own master;
Self Mastery’s the key
To seeing you through.

Only you have the power
To transport your feelings,
Relocate your attitude,
Paradigms shift;

Your enterprise calls you,
Your quest is not over
Until you can finally
Receive your own gift.

The gift of your choices
Will not hear excuses,
Your life is your own,
You make it what you will;

Conscious navigation
Will bring new horizons,
While gratitude makes
You with happiness fill.

~ Evelyn Mercy Price
All Rights Reserved

 

About The Author : Today we bring to you not just a super talented being but a beautiful heart who is not just a voice but the voice. The very one who selflessly seeks to uplift not just Poetry but also poets themselves.
Evelyn Mercy Price has been writing poetry and short stories since before she could properly spell. Over the past 30 some odd years Price has written many short stories and song lyrics, as well as hundreds of poems. Currently, she is in the editing process of her debut novel which will appear in verse. In 2016 Evelyn began Poetic Moments Monday; a weekly blog post featuring a different poet who was born on that day. Evelyn hopes that by sharing these poets’ words, as well as her own poems, she will be able to touch lives, helping others to recognize and appreciate poetry more, and to find their own voices as well.

We look forward to seeing Price glow on! Within the literary field and beyond!!

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Word-Perfect Monday (WPM)

The Hallelujah of our Tomorrow

by Eden Benibo

Growing up,
I watched my mother
Fold my dreams neatly
And placed them safely
At a corner in her heart.
And even when the storms
Of life tried to blow visions
Out of sight
She always had those dreams in mind,
Constantly reminding me of not who I should be
But who I am.

I watched my mother
Laugh out loud
The sound of her laughter
Rang a bell of assurance,
Even at a point when there were so many pointless reasons to stay strong
.
Whenever she scratched my back
My legs would clap together
As her hands ran through
The exact spot of my discomfort,
She always had a way of making a frown drown in a sea of smiles
.
I watched my mother teach me the rudiments of life.
Her eyes a display of lessons untold
Her voice, the depth knowledge finely knitted.
An intertwined of hope, wisdom and faith
An unconnectedly connected trio
Forming a loop:
A replacement to the loopholes life tried to create in our desire for a better tomorrow
.
She never taught me how to pray,
I mean, pray to have the best
Rather, I was taught to become it
To become that thing called best.
So daily,
She called me best
And in our prayers we knew we were the hallelujah of our tomorrow
.
Sometimes,
I suddenly felt my dreams had become strangers to me
Even when these dreams were already indigenes of my mother’s heart,
And I just wondered how & why
A person would love you even more than you love yourself.
.
They say tomorrow
Will take care of itself
And so did we.
I watched my mother
Watch me grow into a better tomorrow
Who could take care of herself even when the rain refuses to drizzle and the sun decline shinning,
A tomorrow
An envy of our yesterday
And the longings of our today
Gradually,
I am becoming
The wishes of my yesterday
And the goals of my today for tomorrow.
.
From the very beginning,
She saw a future
Tinted in victory
Even when I was colour blind
To see the silver lining
At the end of the tunnel
.
With the masterpiece of my dreams in my being
And a copy still neatly and safely seated at the bottom of her heart
Bit by bit
We see our better tomorrow unfold before our eyes.

-Eden Benibo

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