Spotlighting Pan-African Poetry

Biography

I am a 100%

Enlarge poem

I am a 100%

Do not be fooled by the tears
Threatening to roll
Down these cheeks
Do not be fooled by the heartache
You see in my eyes
Do not be fooled by the
scarring across my heart

Evidence of the days,
I hung my head in shame
Pledging never to fall in love again

Do not be fooled by the complexity
Of the wonderful wreck that is my life
I own my mistakes and live for the future

so “Ha elegorekenete, mosadikegalasewathubega”

Then call me mosaic
For I have been broken
Into a thousand pieces more times than
I care to count.

I have been shattered against
The hard cold backdrop of life
Meet a darling man, he raised me to great heights
Only to come tumbling down

Tossed aside
For a newer model.
One with fewer problems
And a bigger engine to boot
How could I possibly compete?

Smiling,
Sometimes I look back at days gone by
Days when
We danced upon imaginary clouds,
To the sounds of crickets
And bullfrogs
Days when Stars, were neighbors of ours
our room lit up by the moon,
through the cracks in our ceiling.

Never worrying about.
Money for fine dining
Or wearing fancy clothes to a fancy
do,
of some fancy thing which we
Knew not much about

Do not be fooled,
By my pretty smile
And my contagious laugh.
I have been bitten soul sucking sadness
dragged to the bottom of the deepest and darkest
Emotional pits of despair,
I have hit rock bottom
Only to fall into
Its underground basement

Do not be fooled by the
Stillettos, I wear
My legs have given way
To pressure
More times than I care to remember
I have struggled to stand, knees wobbly
Calves aching as my body aged overnight

Do not be fooled
By my sobriety
I have been to the bottom of ever
Vodka bottle known to man
I have woken up to
Hangovers that felt too raw
To be real
I was the poster girl of
Class A alcoholism
Using it to numb the pain
And block our reality

Suppressing all my dreams
And desires
Because I couldn’t cope
Couldn’t dare to wish for me
Fearing to reach out
For help.

Do not be fooled by
by
The perfect application
Of my foundation,
I still break out.

Do not be fooled by the swing
of my tiny waist
And my delectable peach like behind
My tummy could be firmer.

Do not be fooled by
all my imperfections
none of them have shattered my soul
the trying times, I have encountered,
I wouldn’t erase
Never easy to deal with,
Alas they made me stronger

Do not be fooled by what life’s taken from me
I am a 100%
100% of the woman
I have always wanted to be
Never you mind, how my journey got me
Here.
Never you mind, where I have been
Never you mind what is to become of me
Never you mind.
For I AM
A HUNDRED PERCENT….

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Letang Selepe

Featured Poem:

Masked Ball

Enlarge poem

Swaying to the sounds
Of songs unwritten,
Our bodies
Moving side by side
To a rhythm set millions
Of years ago

Hearing Echoes of
A past long buried
Creatures long gone
Never to roam again
Seeing glimpses of a future
Bleak at best,
Temperatures rising
Populations of fauna
Dropping to depressing lows

We look on….

Hiding behind the
Masks we created to
Hide unshed tears
At a world we have filled
With more calamities
Than happiness

A world covered in smog
Smog so dense, we can barely see the stars
From our very own porches

Wonder what would be if
Smartypantsyphones
And electronic tablets
Shut down
And we were
Yanked by the nape of our necks
From the comforts of our very own sofa’s
And mother nature tore our eyelids from our very eyes.

So with unblinking eyes
We are forced to watch as
The place we call home
Disintegrates, under our very care

Temperatures rising
Until the scorching heat
Burns our skins off.
Vultures yanking our tongues out
In vengeance for all the harm
We’ve thrust upon them

Unable to scream

Silently watching
As carnivores of all shapes
And sizes
Feed off our very feet
So we cannot outrun
The sewer rats as they
Feed off our very limbs
For all the times
We could not let them be

Our remains finished of
By our own kind
A fellow human being
like you and i
All because they have no
meals to feed upon…

Afterwards putting on the very same masks
We wore, when we thought we had it,
all under control, pretending to care
Yet never caring enough…
to protect that which we could

So,
So long as the globe keeps spinning
They too will sway to unwritten songs
Of ages gone by…
Until the end
When all shall cease
Sadly,
with none….. at peace

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Masked Ball by Letang Selepe

Download the audio file

How does this featured poem make you feel?

  • Amazement (5)
  • Pride (3)
  • Optimism (2)
  • Anger (2)
  • Delight (1)
  • Inspiration (4)
  • Reflection (1)
  • Captivation (2)
  • Peace (1)
  • Amusement (0)
  • Sorrow (0)
  • Vigour (0)
  • Hope (1)
  • Sadness (0)
  • Fear (0)
  • Jubilation (0)

Comments

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Botswana

Biography

There are days when Letang Selepe wakes up feeling like a ripe and wise 50 year old, and other days a scared and confused 16 year old girl. She is actually a 28 year old Tswana woman, from a small village called Ramokgonami. She spent most of her pre high school years in a small mining town called Selebi-Phikwe. Lived in Zimbabwe for a good 4 years, and dwelled in Francistown and Gaborone thereafter. Lived in the USA for a magical year, where she met amazing people from all over the world. She came back home, yearning to write again.

She currently resides in Maun, and it is here where she stopped caging in her emotions and let them roam free on paper.

Poetry captivates you, in the now, it move’s you between different worlds. It is for this reason that she was drawn to writing, poetry was a path to healing, a path to acceptance. Most of her poetry stems from her own reality.

Letang Selepe

Botswana

Biography

There are days when Letang Selepe wakes up feeling like a ripe and wise 50 year old, and other days a scared and confused 16 year old girl. She is actually a 28 year old Tswana woman, from a small village called Ramokgonami. She spent most of her pre high school years in a small mining town called Selebi-Phikwe. Lived in Zimbabwe for a good 4 years, and dwelled in Francistown and Gaborone thereafter. Lived in the USA for a magical year, where she met amazing people from all over the world. She came back home, yearning to write again.

She currently resides in Maun, and it is here where she stopped caging in her emotions and let them roam free on paper.

Poetry captivates you, in the now, it move’s you between different worlds. It is for this reason that she was drawn to writing, poetry was a path to healing, a path to acceptance. Most of her poetry stems from her own reality.

I am a 100%

Enlarge poem

I am a 100%

Do not be fooled by the tears
Threatening to roll
Down these cheeks
Do not be fooled by the heartache
You see in my eyes
Do not be fooled by the
scarring across my heart

Evidence of the days,
I hung my head in shame
Pledging never to fall in love again

Do not be fooled by the complexity
Of the wonderful wreck that is my life
I own my mistakes and live for the future

so “Ha elegorekenete, mosadikegalasewathubega”

Then call me mosaic
For I have been broken
Into a thousand pieces more times than
I care to count.

I have been shattered against
The hard cold backdrop of life
Meet a darling man, he raised me to great heights
Only to come tumbling down

Tossed aside
For a newer model.
One with fewer problems
And a bigger engine to boot
How could I possibly compete?

Smiling,
Sometimes I look back at days gone by
Days when
We danced upon imaginary clouds,
To the sounds of crickets
And bullfrogs
Days when Stars, were neighbors of ours
our room lit up by the moon,
through the cracks in our ceiling.

Never worrying about.
Money for fine dining
Or wearing fancy clothes to a fancy
do,
of some fancy thing which we
Knew not much about

Do not be fooled,
By my pretty smile
And my contagious laugh.
I have been bitten soul sucking sadness
dragged to the bottom of the deepest and darkest
Emotional pits of despair,
I have hit rock bottom
Only to fall into
Its underground basement

Do not be fooled by the
Stillettos, I wear
My legs have given way
To pressure
More times than I care to remember
I have struggled to stand, knees wobbly
Calves aching as my body aged overnight

Do not be fooled
By my sobriety
I have been to the bottom of ever
Vodka bottle known to man
I have woken up to
Hangovers that felt too raw
To be real
I was the poster girl of
Class A alcoholism
Using it to numb the pain
And block our reality

Suppressing all my dreams
And desires
Because I couldn’t cope
Couldn’t dare to wish for me
Fearing to reach out
For help.

Do not be fooled by
by
The perfect application
Of my foundation,
I still break out.

Do not be fooled by the swing
of my tiny waist
And my delectable peach like behind
My tummy could be firmer.

Do not be fooled by
all my imperfections
none of them have shattered my soul
the trying times, I have encountered,
I wouldn’t erase
Never easy to deal with,
Alas they made me stronger

Do not be fooled by what life’s taken from me
I am a 100%
100% of the woman
I have always wanted to be
Never you mind, how my journey got me
Here.
Never you mind, where I have been
Never you mind what is to become of me
Never you mind.
For I AM
A HUNDRED PERCENT….

Featured Poem:

Masked Ball

Enlarge poem

Swaying to the sounds
Of songs unwritten,
Our bodies
Moving side by side
To a rhythm set millions
Of years ago

Hearing Echoes of
A past long buried
Creatures long gone
Never to roam again
Seeing glimpses of a future
Bleak at best,
Temperatures rising
Populations of fauna
Dropping to depressing lows

We look on….

Hiding behind the
Masks we created to
Hide unshed tears
At a world we have filled
With more calamities
Than happiness

A world covered in smog
Smog so dense, we can barely see the stars
From our very own porches

Wonder what would be if
Smartypantsyphones
And electronic tablets
Shut down
And we were
Yanked by the nape of our necks
From the comforts of our very own sofa’s
And mother nature tore our eyelids from our very eyes.

So with unblinking eyes
We are forced to watch as
The place we call home
Disintegrates, under our very care

Temperatures rising
Until the scorching heat
Burns our skins off.
Vultures yanking our tongues out
In vengeance for all the harm
We’ve thrust upon them

Unable to scream

Silently watching
As carnivores of all shapes
And sizes
Feed off our very feet
So we cannot outrun
The sewer rats as they
Feed off our very limbs
For all the times
We could not let them be

Our remains finished of
By our own kind
A fellow human being
like you and i
All because they have no
meals to feed upon…

Afterwards putting on the very same masks
We wore, when we thought we had it,
all under control, pretending to care
Yet never caring enough…
to protect that which we could

So,
So long as the globe keeps spinning
They too will sway to unwritten songs
Of ages gone by…
Until the end
When all shall cease
Sadly,
with none….. at peace

Masked Ball by Letang Selepe

Download the audio file

How does this featured poem make you feel?

  • Amazement (5)
  • Pride (3)
  • Optimism (2)
  • Anger (2)
  • Delight (1)
  • Inspiration (4)
  • Reflection (1)
  • Captivation (2)
  • Peace (1)
  • Amusement (0)
  • Sorrow (0)
  • Vigour (0)
  • Hope (1)
  • Sadness (0)
  • Fear (0)
  • Jubilation (0)

I am a 100%

Enlarge poem

I am a 100%

Do not be fooled by the tears
Threatening to roll
Down these cheeks
Do not be fooled by the heartache
You see in my eyes
Do not be fooled by the
scarring across my heart

Evidence of the days,
I hung my head in shame
Pledging never to fall in love again

Do not be fooled by the complexity
Of the wonderful wreck that is my life
I own my mistakes and live for the future

so “Ha elegorekenete, mosadikegalasewathubega”

Then call me mosaic
For I have been broken
Into a thousand pieces more times than
I care to count.

I have been shattered against
The hard cold backdrop of life
Meet a darling man, he raised me to great heights
Only to come tumbling down

Tossed aside
For a newer model.
One with fewer problems
And a bigger engine to boot
How could I possibly compete?

Smiling,
Sometimes I look back at days gone by
Days when
We danced upon imaginary clouds,
To the sounds of crickets
And bullfrogs
Days when Stars, were neighbors of ours
our room lit up by the moon,
through the cracks in our ceiling.

Never worrying about.
Money for fine dining
Or wearing fancy clothes to a fancy
do,
of some fancy thing which we
Knew not much about

Do not be fooled,
By my pretty smile
And my contagious laugh.
I have been bitten soul sucking sadness
dragged to the bottom of the deepest and darkest
Emotional pits of despair,
I have hit rock bottom
Only to fall into
Its underground basement

Do not be fooled by the
Stillettos, I wear
My legs have given way
To pressure
More times than I care to remember
I have struggled to stand, knees wobbly
Calves aching as my body aged overnight

Do not be fooled
By my sobriety
I have been to the bottom of ever
Vodka bottle known to man
I have woken up to
Hangovers that felt too raw
To be real
I was the poster girl of
Class A alcoholism
Using it to numb the pain
And block our reality

Suppressing all my dreams
And desires
Because I couldn’t cope
Couldn’t dare to wish for me
Fearing to reach out
For help.

Do not be fooled by
by
The perfect application
Of my foundation,
I still break out.

Do not be fooled by the swing
of my tiny waist
And my delectable peach like behind
My tummy could be firmer.

Do not be fooled by
all my imperfections
none of them have shattered my soul
the trying times, I have encountered,
I wouldn’t erase
Never easy to deal with,
Alas they made me stronger

Do not be fooled by what life’s taken from me
I am a 100%
100% of the woman
I have always wanted to be
Never you mind, how my journey got me
Here.
Never you mind, where I have been
Never you mind what is to become of me
Never you mind.
For I AM
A HUNDRED PERCENT….

Comments

Your email address will not be published.