WHEN I FELL IN LOVE

By Esther Jeruto Koros

My dear mere girl, my mother sounding mean             

If you go seeking pebbles, you will never get enough

So, pick them huge, pick them rough

Scour them clean, until they gleam

And make your castle, the world to puzzle

 

My dear mere girl, my mother sounding deep

When silence disquiets, don’t be lured by the loud

Pay heed to the quiet, that lets on the ghosts 

Lift the dense rock, expose the hideous rot

For today’s museums, ensue from former scars

 

My dear mere girl, my mother sounding sanguine

The segments that you are, for which you are insomniac

Get the audacity to glue, holding each chunk to brew 

The greatest goddesses subsisting, clawed deep into the mist 

For embracing the shreds, is the journey to wholeness 

 

Thus grew a woman, not just a mere girl

Delightfully content, in the castle of her skin

 Loving the shreds, hitherto her dreads

Now ghosts are named, and skeletons fully fleshed

Wholeness visited, stayed. I fell in love with me!

 © July 2020

THE ELECTORATE

By Esther Jeruto Koros

In the years of antiquity, began the inequity 

An electorate of two, and a nomination of two  

I stood as much chance, just as my opponent

And the counting, was all daunting

I lost to the incumbent, as the caucus determined

‘Your opponent, a full man  

And you, a wee man

Small by all means, albeit the suffrage right

Although your vote was one, and his as well

Yours though one, wants in apathy

His is one, brawny and not wan’

 I in sanguine bolster, conceded to the pollster  

Over twenty centuries, two voters seemed to compete  

Yet the ‘he’ triumphs, wrecking me in bigotry

But all hail! Just wait

Of moral nobility I boast, the Second Sex appends   

To applaud De Beauvoir, I once again recoup

The twenty third century trip, will all be my grip.     

 

© July 2020