Shadows of yesterday by Hasan simani dedicated to BROTHERS, sisters,
siblings, AMAI Divine AND BABA DIVINE, ELFINA AND ISMAEL, DESMOND,
and UZ BROTHERS AND SISTERS, ZIVEZANO HIGH
This is poetry meant to be spoken, so call it spoken word ministries of
HASAN SIMANI:
AVAILABLE IN PRINT
AND AUDIO…
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I attest to the belief if you want to go up,
You need to concentrate, navigate and demonstrate,
Yours is history more like espousal of pragmatic philosophy
Let me use my poetic abilities to pay homage to your masterpiece
Achieved with sheer hard work, sweat and struggle
You subscribed to optimism even the tide of assignments were pressing your ship to sink
It gave you more time to read and think sometimes you never slept one wink
No-night shifts, your graduation is an earthly gift
God above whose glory shines in the dark make the thin to be thick
Even straightening crooked paths more like banana- free- kick
Thumps- up PAPA Hasan
It was rough and tough but now you laugh
The devil is a liar today shame on him we put him handcuffs
Where are they who used to huff and puff useless staff?
This is inspiring news daily to the youth to follow yours
I wanna be like PAPA, YEAH nice to watch yourself being part of those who are
crowned
Insert confidence and take criticism as misplaced grammar
Don’t trouble your soul you are a Legend of Simani
Let this graduation be an elevation from the bottom to the top what is left domination
Be flexible like water and continue to flow like diamonds you glow
Optimism is a man who counted apples in a seed rather seeds in an apple
A caution to the dark blowing winds
Don’t touch these men are honourables
Don’t dare their knowledge is beyond your expectation they are untouchables
Your song is a melody refined in a piano beat box
I just wanna smile and clap hands when your name is called.
It is high time we end these disagreements, discord
Embrace change to foster peace, let’s disagree to agree, choose one GOD.
Starting today we must pick ourselves up remove the dust and begin renovate our
love, Let us not starve our hearts what they desire lest they die of hunger
Arguments are costly to our relationship, let’s face the challenge together
Weaken the base of conflict and have collective mentality we can do
I’m ready to be yours hear your comments too
Fall to my knees, with all respect
Let us rework our love zone together we created
Love is precious thing but refuse to spoil it with little stuff so dangerous like hot staff
Haters’ huff and puff don’t let them win,
Put them handcuffs
I feel inside of my heart kicking, a blood rush a quick force of adrenaline
Humbled to be part of your life
We braved together through tough times
Faced challenges together that cannot be forgotten
Memorable in our love’s unfolding chapters
I know I’m perfectly incomplete but if my heart is stained with sorrow it needs yours to
wash away the pain
Let us silence critics lest we might be subject to ridicule
Be successful like a business with demand beyond their control
A little fight cannot put a full stop to our love
And affection
Love is our common language, common defense, capital to our marriage
We built this together with trust and passion
Then if you wish to say goodbye
That’s okay; I cannot force you to choose what you like
Even if you go let’s rewrite the book of peace if you choose them no problem, but if you
choose me we work together.
LET me take this moment to revise the
Inflammatory statements of the minds that
Were diseased, exorcised now they are released
Are we to let our mentality be infringed?
Look to the past and stretch our imagination to the wildest
See the blood stains that substituted winter morning dew
Soldiers who died for this country they braved through tough times,
The bullet harvesting lives scattering brains
Flesh torn apart to be stew
It fostered bliss but comrades of the same crew
Fighting again to destroy peace
They wink at each other with murder in their eyes, but when they come to us they
pretend,
Media lies
There is no smoke without fire, fire produces smoke
Soften your judgements we suffered a lot brothers with politics of cynicism
All we need is politics that knows no boundaries
Politics of optimism,
I do agree we are different but our difference doesn’t mean we should separate, united
we stand
Look at the marginalised community waiting with long faces
They need food to cheat the hunger
Money to pay exorbitant rent bills, electricity
To repair the roof of their lives
And the youth resorted to bronco, chateau
Super a strong staff made of yeast and mealie-meal, no clinics for them when they are
ill
Frustrated they can’t continue they lack the will
Empower them; give them jobs for their sorrows to heal
Just a deal to pay today’s meal
Jobs aren’t real
The optimistic surface peeling dramatically
Even the educated professors questioning ontologically,
Let’s reject the myth of apathy
Rework Zimbabwe again with a peaceful reign,
Let us be patient, because those who believe shall never grieve
We may not built this in one day but Rome wasn’t built in a day
Unyielding and enduring spirit of hope
Opening doors for the youth to discover their talents
It is ultimately your faith, our faith united Zimbabwe again
We are people of improbable hope
Let’s rewrite peace accord
And tell ourselves we are no longer weeping willows
And multiple love only hellos, hellos ……….
Just because my mouth talk aloud, doesn’t mean my words always the same
I speak like it is even curious about the moments I miss never worry about their diss
Like a snake they hiss but all I do is to smile and foster peace to birth bliss
In relation to the poets of the past take my pen and paper clean all the dust especially
mind rust
Like a fishermen my words I cast
I know when you read them they last
I don’t want your failures make you stink
Being pulled from the wise to those fools of lowest rank
And take thief -point -of view to rob a bank
I attest to the belief you can do like Einstein you become a think- tank
I want you to smile like the sun, even you to become better than mine
All my wishes to see you brother
Some moments can be rough and tough
But you need to seek peace inside of you and laugh
But you can’t continue to huff and puff
Annoyed with useless staff
Don’t take drugs to self-medicate you, especially crack that dangerous staff
Lung cancer, bronchiolitis, good die young some of them so pathetic when they cough
You are free to choose, but you are not free from the consequence of your choice
Believe me you one day is yours
Never worry about backstabbers, thus why they are on your back
All I want is you to keep evil in check
Ask GOD help me in this and that, especially where I lack.
Thank him in times of glee
No sadness last forever neither does pain
Tomorrow you’re free,
Clouds are building rain.
Your problems may be great, but you were born great
Unclench your fist you shall see your best
Let the word of GOD quench your thirst
All things are possible and let go problems on your chest
Appreciate life the dawn with the morning sun
Copy with the evil become Jesus fan
To those in quest of your virtue, I will advise you run!
Life is a battlefield with the devil initially throwing missiles one by one
All you do is to duck with the prayers and fasts, inversely, you hear them falling in
JESUS NAME ONE BY ONE
Your mind is a battlefield
FIGHT for survival and faith becomes your strongest shield
Watch your enemy closely he is pretending to be dead
Don’t flow so quickly like soup in the plate
Just be steady
Appreciate what GOD made the food you ate everyday
Don’t judge their cosmology with facts of science biology
Or human science psychology
Your duty is to appreciate them and know them better, assist them later than to label
them
“You are psychotic, you are depressive finding their pathology”
Appreciate life no matter how tough
Jointly together lets laugh
Remember him the only LORD WITH THE WISDOM
AND HOPE TO SUCCEED IN THE NEXT AND CHERISH THE KINGDOM
HASAN SIMANI @ POETRY# GOD BLESSES YOU.
BEFORE, I begin lemme greet you like I’m supposed to do, hello brothers and sisters
May peace be upon you (assalamu aleikum)
The world is so crazy but don’t follow the hellish ways blindly
The world (dunyah) pleases you with fake happiness
And random dudes teaching you wrong ways (haram)
You smoke in privacy choking your perfect lungs
You prostitute your body in darkness but subtracting your health -
1
Wait for the right man to discover the pride of your virginity not to open your blouse
for men to see your cleavage before ripe time
(You’re still young but you got bigger appetites)
You don’t have the shame leaving them unclosed
Your body disclosed on the internet as porn played different times and paused
Costing your legacy and you call it piracy
Is this a business?
The world is so rude they will chuck you out
Like shooing away hens out of the house
Doctors too keep on hypothesising
“Maybe you got an allergy
You need new lungs …. $120000000
Worth your medication
Im sorry you got nothing in your bank account
Except to open your palms waiting for charitable reflexes”
Your majestic sense of wellness begins to fade
Substituted with thoughts of suicide
You chose to end yourself the hard way
Because the world deemed you wrong
The world is so stressful that you think your soul no longer fit you feel a tingle in your
spine
You look at the stars planted like trees
My friend heaven is a life beyond death
But because you listen to the slander that says
“Religion is the opium of the masses and
A hopeful figment of the weak minds”
And you adopted hands-off attitude
Inescapably, the heavens calls your name
It’s like an examination question written compulsory
Uneducated chit-chat cannot back you my friend
Feel the zeal to repent your sins
Collaborate with Jesus to destroy despairs
I come from the land of peace
Where everybody is treated like a king or queen
I come from the land of peace where the voice of truth reaches out to everybody like
the touch of the wind
I come from the future where love is an endless stream
And hatred is shallow and pathetic
I come from the future where death is a slave
Because paradise is life
I come from the future where hope lies in patience
Because patience document the end as sweet
I come from the future where knowledge is stored in the heart and the soul
Because written papers can be spoiled
I come from the future with folks who donate smiles
Because love is the motto of Brothers and sisters
If you wanna get out of your bottomless pit follow Highway Code from the prophet’s
mouth repeating the same words of the LORD
IF HE CALLS YOU A'adhdhana (It means time to pray)
AAMIIN (MAY GOD ANSWER THE PRAYER)
IN TIMES OF GLEE, ALHAMUDILLAH, ALLAAHU ‘AKBAR (THANK YOU, ALLAH THE
GREATEST)
I came from the unknown land to become known
Only MAMA and Papa can trace me back the result of their friendship
Or the doctors who watched me grew in the womb with microscope eyes
Starting as tiny balls of flesh resulting from meiosis
The processes continued one after the other, the biological sequence
I fed through the umbilical cord and the placenta acting as defence
Sometimes mother recalled the kicks I made
And sometimes being rushed to the clinic sensing something bad
Nurses told her the child is safe
He is a boy rehearsing to come on earth
Later when nine months lapsed she gave birth
To a baby bouncing boy
Ululations, whistles family members in time of glee
Another shoot for the family tree
Their minds pondered questions
What shall we call him, since the child is a HE?
My Father chose from A TO Z
Alphabet maze
Letter H- was picked from the rest
What was left was to fit the vowels
A, E, I, O, U
A WAS THE BEST
AND CHOSE FROM THE CONSONANTS AGAIN
S and N,
The name became HASAN,
AN ISLAMIC NAME FROM IRAN
Let me pay homage to you father and Mother who watched me grew
Linchpins to my upbringing who taught me, little meat is called stew,
Toilet training skilful at 3 Years i rushed to the loo
Don’t talk when elders are talking number 1 rule,
Alone sometimes playing with different toys from dolls to cars
During the night I liked the full moon and the stars
I staged fights with circumstances but I braved through
Primary up to University
And your love never bends neither your strengths.
Pour out wisdom to mankind
Ordaining your brain with hope that perfect your grind
Enactment of knowledge building blocks of the mind
Trading sorrows no longer weeping willows
Renovating worn out stories feeling relaxed like mellows
You are the one to build love and multiply hellos, hellos
Obedient to the sun to cheer up when rain falls
Furthermore, listen attentively in no minutes our lord calls
Heaven open floodgates of grace
And welcome grace with an embrace,
Smiling face,
Aim for the sky is the limit
Nothing is impossible with repentance as paradise permit
Attentive to the cries of the marginalised
Buttressing the falling walls
Competent to deconstruct problems confronting statements or non-verbal cues wisely
Diagnosing sometimes with the DSM-V, doesn’t pursue self interest
Enacting hope to the weak willed extremely ethical
Finding ways to intervene
Guiding the process of therapy
History taking to know the client
Inspiring to the community
Joking with the clients jests rest their sorrows
Keep on asking until he/she perceives the abstract
Listening to what is said and unsaid
Monitoring change
Numbering stages taking notes
Openness to the new reality of the client
Pumping hope like increasing air in a flat tyre
Quoting the previous to match the now
Smiling not surrendering to summon courage inside
Renovating the peeling optimistic surface
Teaming with the client/s
Uniting psychology and culture
Verifying what worked and voting for policies that promote mental health
Willingness to help those in need
X Exorcise myths and misconceptions
Years of experience in psychotherapy
Zealous about identifying client’s needs
Poetry is a natural flow like blood from
artery to vein
Circulating back to the heart and the rest
of the body
(I recall my Science Teacher Amai
Ponde)
Every word following a lace stunning and
puzzling like a puzzle
Reminiscing Shakespeare’s sonnets
And blank verses of Milton
What forced me to write wasn’t the idea to create fame
I write what I write poets are not the same
But the unity of their words together inspire wisdom
Poetry is a job that civilises the poet to play with every word
Sometimes interchangeably word play
Some poets marvel the art of casting smiles with powerful jests
Others make you ponder your bad side with a sarcastic tongue
Some buttress the bone- lazy with their mental calcium
Every word is like an ingredient deficiency of one
Creates a disaster
Ask a cake baker Amai Mudzimu she will tell you follow the recipe religiously
Word after word like a conjoint prayer of Hasan and His uncle Baba LEON
Attractive and beautiful words like roses
Marvellous and special like pearls
Diamonds ready to be seen they GLOW
Listen to every word like my Brother Desmond attentive to every soccer detail
Or flirting with words like proposing a girl
Words do emphasise like a coffin’s last nail
Poets work tirelessly no-night shifts like BABA Mudzimu compiling health logistics
Or Mr Simani Sacrificing time to eat for the benefit of the grade Sevens,
Words can be used too to describe statistics
Words are faithful like a good friendship Owen and Hasan,
Words are action-thrillers like Deedsmore exhibiting gymnastics
Words are like Benjamin Muzinda pondering what to do with urban planning drawings
Words speak with repetition like my Teacher Mr HAU used to say “know the canonical
and pre-canonical prophets”
Words are relevant but becomes irrelevant when loosely used like an essay marked by
Mr Muderedzwa “irrelevant”
In English they tell you wrong word, misplaced grammar Mr Nhongo and MR Hungwe
say servant not “savant” wrong spelling
Words build a wall with different courses like Amai Mukarati teaching us English bond
and queen closure
Words are inspiring like Mr Shumba a counsellor with honey motivation
He got the exposure and composure
Words they brave through even its tough like Robias Hungwe soaring high in Excellency
Words form music ask UNCLE Didza he will tell you hook plus Verses I’m ready to spit
the bars
So every word is important like gestalt principle “the whole is greater the sum of its
parts”.
These kids learn so much but replace do’s with
don’ts
Time will tell those who listened attentively
Visions becoming blurred with hidden faults of yesterday
Results of 2016 some with Aes, Bees, Cees, Dees, Ees,
Uus and O0s wastage of school fees
What did you do when others were busy?
You neither loved the whip
Like thunder it struck but it was for your good
Nor pages you flipped
Come and beat me!
You recite a confession today
Drenching in tears
Measuring the consequence of your choice
Look at yourself a skinny kid travelling a hellish path
Hormones were pumping into your body
Attracting men like houseflies
Pick yourself up little girl substitute sorrow with sweet words
Now listen maybe it’s the last time
I want you to become a nugget of gold
To conquer it all do as you’re told
Teachers want transformation in you from that point to that point
Like bearing in mathematics
Zap nacks, sweet words of boys don’t last like cosmetics
Cut open the slices of education eat and eat it taste sweet
Don’t frown sister wait in the middle of the beat, the flow is neat
You shall hear billions if not trillions of hope prompting you to reach the stars
Maybe one day you visit Mars
Read to understand pain shall come to pass
Feed your mind with verbiage of hope
Your speech shall be reinforced with flowery diction
Your legacy become a concrete noun
Build your life nicely like English bond
Wedge your weakness with a queen closure
Take note of history too
With some of the fools who preached rules
And forgot rules can be malleable
Who knew Napoleon would fall?
The battle of Waterloo ended it all
See my brother the topography
But dig deep into the nucleus of the life
All we want to hear is your intellectual progeny
Don’t be trapped into the devil’s decoy
Poverty got neither bonus nor pay
Come let me beat you will never die my child
My name is education
ME +
YOU = 1
OR X + Y
=1
So peace starts with you brothers and sisters of the
same tribe
Hatred is a nuisance wanna make it X+ Y= -1
OR divide it by 2 we get half and half
But GOD made us 1
The outside is blue, brown, and black and white just an illusion
Conspiracy theories finding foolish reasons
The inside is a red-flowing river
Not surprising those with cruel tones dies too
Don’t disrespect a human being without knowing you got the human side too
You are just spreading a shame “big fool”
Love one another number 1 rule
Not need to show up your razor-sharp horns you’re the biggest bull
Shaytaan is using you don’t be rude just chill learn to be cool
To embrace everything and praise when they do good WAAL
Fire words of truth and blaze them more
Feel the faith beats inside of you open your heart’s door
Wordplay toughest sounds to create make them good quite a finish like a house floor
Co-create today’s sweetness with neatness
Crazy like a psycho but mark my words let them ring and ring until they echo
In your sleep they cause you to wake up
And imbibe the truth ….
Ambuya is gone
That beauty faded like petals withering in the harsh sun
And tremendous silence descended
My eyes standing deep in the tides of tears
I watched the sun withdrew his golden rays
Glancing at the eventide wearing a cloak of darkness
I heard a rustle of feet through the grass
I took head and saw death approaching like a guest
He approached my grandmother and wooed her until she vowed to close her eyes
When I went into the room my grandmother was dead blind
And death had vanished like a puff of smoke into the sky
She died with her mouth unclosed her body shaking for the last time like an epileptic
A desperate dance of death to be imprisoned in foul dungeon of death’s dictates
Who knew death enters through the bolted gates, watchful guards undisturbed
I remember the summer afternoons sitting relaxed with her rose cheeks so fine
Cheerful pulling mangoes off from the tree branches so yellow and ripe
Swallowing the mango juice so sweet like happiness never-ending
She was born with the reflexes of charity her words were spoken with clarity
Then everything changed like minutes to hours and hours to decades
Hearing weeping voices with men digging the grave six feet down
The seventh Adventist in their green attire their songs psalmodic
Giving their last farewells
Ambuya chipadza is surely gone
She brought laughter to the fields
A well which all thirsty souls drank
Dried up and became has-been or was –been
Her day had been co-signed
I just waved my goodbye a last phase with my eyes soaked in tears
Many women’s feet became limper with despair
And watched siblings Charles, cosmas, Ishmael, zacheus, Egnetta
Uncle Zvavamwenye, Hamandishe, Kuvengwa all in a grief phase
And the poet too was busy meditating what to write
He did not apostate from his theme
He gave Ambuya last respect wishing her glad tidings for eternity
To see again the never-ending rivers of gold and fields of stunning silver
RIVER OF DEATH (KACHE SWEPT AWAY)
The sun surrendered and withdrew his rays
Following was a blanket of darkness
Sadness if not despair, the sky grew angry with gusty winds chasing the dark clouds
Sending a shudder of fear to the human race and lower animals
The lion lost his voice searching for prey unaware of the danger
His legs became weak, off -balance he fell into a ditch
The wife ran fast to the cave and watched her husband being swept away into the
river of death
He died a painful death
The off springs became orphans tears cascading down
The off springs were now weeping willows
Pastors cried in the church, O, Lord!
Chapter 2
It rained hard with streams vomiting water into the river of death
The river became a desperate water body receiving every unlucky fauna and flora
Who knew this was a final day of sungano Kache Gono Mkapa?
He became a victim of the flash floods
It was a fateful Sunday
With friends they tried to cross the turbulent flow
Feeling tipsy with home-made brewery
Kache surrendered to the velocity
Others watched him rolling like a piece of twig
It was too late to give a rescue hand
Chapter 3
The news came so swift like perfume in the air
It became a rumour that reached the Ziana
I was busy meditating verses of the KORAN
Then I heard a ringing tone of my android phone
Click the receiving button
Sad news greeted me shell shocking
“KACHE WAS SWEPT BY THE RIVER TRYING TO CROSS MUTIRIKWI
RIVER OF DEATH – WE ARE TRYING TO SEARCH FOR HIS BODY BUT NO INSIGHT
NOTHING”
I left the phone and began to cry
Later I began to ask but why?
Chapter 4
The crowd assembled with eyes open to search for Kache
Watching severity of the floods
River of death singing violently
If you enter I kill
All-dreading
All -wondering
Where could be the location of Kache?
Chapter 5
The son began to mourn searching for comfort in the art of transcribing
The pain was deep like sea
The poet began his wailing song
Father, Father where are you?
Do you want to be food for the fish?
Do you want your grave to be dug with the mermaids’ folk?
Do you hear my voice in the realm of the dead?
Im your dear Son, Hasan
Whose eyes streaming with tears of despair
Head spinning with confusion
Whose eyes take heed of every rustle of the feet?
Im your dear son, Hasan the poet you left with the book unpublished
I’m your giggling little kid you watched crawling
I wished you could say Goodbye
And I would say ilaa-al liqaa (until next time)
Ma’as-salaama (go in peace)
Chapter 5
Huge gigantic the words that use move with your lisps
Randomly picked when you were intoxicated to amuse the crowd
Do you want to die without anybody’s knowledge?
Do you want be invisible like the wind?
I can hear your soul calling for a perfect home
Come back for the last time and let me give one last respect
I used to love your overfriendly demeanour
Do you want to go to extinction like a Philistine?
COME back and kiss the earth one last goodbye
Epilogue
If death never surrenders then it means it never dies
So long his tongue never rests every flesh shall be prone to danger
KACHE IS NOW HISTORY
BUT NOT A PERFECT ONE
HIS SOUL IN A PRISON
SEARCHING FOR A PERFECT HOME
ALL WE CAN SAY
“Inna faraja. Illaahi quarib” (surely, relief comes from ALLAH)