Kites
I
Kites high above
Beyond fluttering
Beyond recovery
Questioning return.
Are they released
to escape
into tomorrow
without turning
back?
Are kites
as messages in
bottles
high enough
to fly
above dream lands
on magic carpets.
So many holy day
festival kites
fireworks
children calling
from old wooden
swings
ice-cream vendors
and a never-ending
traffic
with nowhere to
go.
Ii
Kites and birds
together
Skies speckled
coloured
Long tails black
and white
Scarves of
ribbons red and green
Blazing with
light
In grey skies
clouded with dust.
Red and purple
Skies brushed
with blue
Lapis and
sapphire the backdrop
Emeralds,
aquamarine, tourmaline
Lightning rays,
shafts of silver light
Against a desert
sand backdrop.
Waving and
curling in skies
Filled with forms
gently waving
Calm, peacefully
finding their paths
Light and dark twisting
in shadows
Waves in the ocean
of blues
glass, lapis, and
blue of the lakes.
Blue as Bandar
Amir’s waters - deep, calm
As the Herat
creations – glistening, cool
As the eyes of Nuristan
– lost in history
As tiles on
Mazar-e-Sharif masjid
As the skies of
early spring – after rain
Blue in reverence.
Merry-go-round
At Eid and
festival times
old wooden
merry-go-rounds
come into
streets,
resurrected from
the past
hidden carefully
for enjoyment again
for delight must
come, happiness
possible, even in
snatches.
Children laughing,
gripping rough wood
Panels unpainted,
rotating, swinging
as if these are
days when fun is allowed
wars are forgotten
in the thrill of rising,
in the fear of
descending to the ground
only to rise once
more,
the thrill all
over again.
Who made this carousel
in dust
in the only space
cleared
in a cramped
neighbourhood?
Who remembers the
thrill,
that excitement
of childhood
enough to make possible
this brief
delight?
Forever children
grown old by war’s destruction
remember these merry-go-round
days,
waiting quietly
with parents
with few
expectations
glad even for
these minutes
when children
smile with eyes lit up
as the merriment
goes round
and round, and
then
- stops.
Adapted from a poem in ‘Afghanistan waiting for
the bus’ (Ginninderra Press 2007)
A member of The Poetry Society, Adèle writes creatively
as Ogiér Jones and calls Freiburg i. Br. and Melbourne home. She has four collections of poems, the latest Counting
the Chiperoni was published by Ginninderra Press (2020) along with her
latest chapbook Bonhommes (Ginninderra Press, 2020), written for artwork
of artist Aziz Kibari. She appears in numerous anthologies and has been shortlisted
and awarded in poetry competitions. The poems presented here were written when she
lived in Afghanistan.
I expecially loved "Around Us!" Great poetry. Put me right there with you.
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