TITLE: Meditation
AUTHOR: Goodness Olanrewaju Ayoola
PUBLISHER: Words Rhymes & Rhythm, Abuja-Nigeria
GENRE: Poetry
YEAR OF PUBLICATION: 2016
PAGES: 121
ISBN: 978-978-954-244-4
REVIEWER: Nosakhare Collins
The world we live in is conjure into played-words full with beautiful art and pieces of riff, as God has give everyone the ability to extend what he/she has inside, to be sure with this words it procreate into light and turn music into experimental verse and spread across the sun and moon in pages. In every poetry read, I evaluate in proximity, but Meditation, a collection of poems has sold a seed of love in my heart to love reading and reading over over again and experiment it by speaking along, by playing with words and enjoying the brain with the meal he has prepared. His collection of poems ‘Meditation’ has eighty-six poems full with LOVE, PAINS, DEATH, TRUTH, HAPPINESS AND PEACE, in all his poems he has brought words to stay and dwell in paper. Ayoola’s has seen the clear view of pains, love and truth and he came to put it in paper using words to heal broken heart and amending it with words that yield all through and his words form into creed and I begin to wonder what kind of religious words he has in speaking what pains feels in the body and what truth feels when we speaks, am too speechless about his words and am satisfied by his feelings for poetry. But it depends what satisfaction means in different dimension, which simply means ‘fulfillment, need and desires has common trace to satisfaction, in all his poem there is fulfillment, need and desires in reading over again. Ayoola’s makes use of words not with prolixity when his needed and when his not.
The first poem ‘nightmares’ speaks what he feel, intrigue ecstasies by exploring experience after and when he wrote it, so he emerge and engage himself to pen his thought on nightmares which the writer speak of himself in two lines which he said:
i did not sleep here
something stole me into my eyes…(pg 17)
His first poem narrates lodge and sojourn of a poet who felt pains and his body subjected; but i remembered ecstasies when the writer said; i do not sleep well. I felt something and I begin to ask, why was his eyes plucked away from his face, as a reader you begin to view point and ask your self a question out of what his saying, what nightmares do to us.
The third poem ’emptiness I-V’ also narrated the sojourn of a poet which he said:
i prey on cluster of darkness
and trap some between the palm of my hands
i stake my fisted-games
over the lashing tongues of fire
i eat the meals of emptiness… (pg 20)
Poetry speaks here in between the first two lines with inept deepness explored and experienced into sentence and the writer also said; i eat the meal of emptiness. I was so furious/rush here when i read it, I begin to read twice because to be empty means you lost in words but his (Ayoola’s) words are never empty. He came again to explain his thought and he said:
I am a hunter of words
and my heart knows me well… (pg 20)
If you are a poet you hunt for words to capture the heart of your readers to understand the feeling you had when you write and words you put in places. Truly I comment his words here.
There was something I notice when I continue in his collection of poems when he talks of upside down in sensitive way which he said:
gift our deaf mother our tribute of ears
tell her that we are the imbalance on the sloppy grounds
she built us the hell-o-heaven
that we took our bows to hunt yesterday
and we could not snare any game for today…
or who hunts in the forest of clouds
and a
s
p
i
l
l
e
d
moon?
who hunts for games
when our world is
u
p
s
I
d
e
down? (pg 24)
I feel so complete about his delightful words he used here and I felt something was missing from me when he said upside down, I begin to wonder in positive and negative side of life what upside down means in right senses, but Ayoola’s address it by saying:
gift our deaf mother our tribute of ears
tell her that we are the Imbalance on the sloppy grounds
Been a poet does not make you a good writer but Ayoola’s has prove himself that poetry sleeps beside him that he’s not just a poet but a scholar who read and write to create new ideals. Ayoola’s ideals have been seen in his collection of poems (Meditation), his words clarified me to read and read all over again.
In his poem ‘my sleeps do lie’ also narrate the journey he face, the labour of African; I believe he felt acrid taste here when he mention it:
i am an African
and this is my labour…
when you see my eyes
lace with ground nights on the grind moon
and my mouth opens for dozing dews
for the slices of the sun on my teeth
and the baked stars in the oven of my heart…
do not think me a victim of repose
my sleeps do lie…
i must have just slipped out of my mouth
to gather the lines hidden in the veins of webs
the poetry in the footprint of wandering mothers
the little demons and fire in darkened huts…
i must have slipped out of my legs
and sit in the corner of suckled cheeks
where the laughter of forefathers fades into shrills
and shrieking shadows of hopes…
i must have become the fury of diarrhea and death
in the belly of evils that have swallowed dreamt dreams
i must have gone like a pregnant hen and restlessness
crackling unceasing for where to lay a new Africa…
my sleeps do lie
do not think me a victim of repose…
i am an African
and this is my labour…(pg 38)
This poem was shortlisted 3rd place in korea-Nigeria poetry Fiesta, 2016, the poem was shape into creative words.
In this poem ‘ my home’ narrate where you can see comfort and dwell in. This poem reminded me the beauty of home. He gave the poem:
i have picked these lines
from the blood that trickles
on the ankles of my tears…
this is my home and my home
but I shall not paint the redness green
and be like the manner of some
who by the left hand of deception
define their father’s house… (pg 74)
Words plays unhidden role here in this poem, there is figure of speech that explore the hiddennes of truth, and perhaps words touches the heart. On this he came to heal the heart again by saying:
for only then we shall begin to heal
for only then we shall be green again. (pg76)
This is how feeling rip us when we deceive our self, I feel the uniqueness and understanding of his words.
Words are inner-creation that become output in healing the heart, become spiritual regeneration of healing; words are powerful as it is powerful to the physical body.
In the poem ‘ Love I’ made me love in the moon with my pen on my hands to write the ecstasies. The poet spoke my mind when he said:
Hold my hands and let us run
Swiftly in this pure rude Ruddy sun
And trap sparking dreams in cloudy blue
Calling me and you.
I feel the exclamation of love here
And I resume my self after tears on my face, tears of joy to love…
He said;
We can sit here on the cold sand bar
And search the sky for the fainted star
The seal of our doting binds
Watching us behind the whitish blinds. (pg 84)
Again I feel the exclamation of love deeply speaking to me here.
In his poem, ‘a child is…’ he narrated it in way that words were used. The poet speaks:
i ponder like in the eyes of a child
and naked thoughts flood my mind, mild
i sprinkle lines in the fountains of words
and my nibs jostle with sheets in the clings of swords… (pg 114)
I kind of feel a touch of words form into spirit that conjugates me…..
In Ayoola’s poems all are narrated in a way that put light and smiles each and everyone faces and I feel the attraction he has with words that protect the soul. The narratology is clear in words, and he has captured the readers mind to read his collection of poems with his words that conjugates, and am not surprised because I believe in him.
Meditation is the creation of Ayoola’s a collection of poems noted with eighty-six poem, meanwhile the young man is a graduate and he has a Nigerian certificate in Education in English and Yoruba Languages and a B.A(ED) in English. He is a teacher in English.
Poetry is an art and an art need to be express publicly with mind of enjoying the full benefit in every piece of work. Nevertheless his poems are full with masterpiece which everyone in globe needs to read and enjoy his/her self with Ayoola Goodness Olanrewaju poems. Meanwhile I will find time to revisit it again with another ecstasy.
Stay blessed with delightful heart, go grab your copy now.
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