The Last Anger

If I were but a grieving child of nature,
born to escape the myths of slow decay
spectator to the violent wreck of beauty,
this dead kingdom would have been no shock.
I would sit all day by my father’s quiet grave,
mourning the memory of his departed soul,
or climb upon the restless grave of my mother
and watch the spiral galaxy of a billion stars
turn into floods, seas, rivers and oceans
where lion whales and gigantic sharks
fight and tear each other to minuscule.
I mourn the horrible, cataclysmic death
of bright, small things that enliven us,
not the beheading of young, green trees
whose branches cluster with healthy pines
and their steamy buds gape at merry-goers.
I grope with tears in the shadows of death
for things I know I can no longer find,
kindness and love, abundant grace, mercy,
the little, invisible gifts humanity can give,
the peace that is the glorious monument of life,
wisdom beyond the grip of the clouds,
where the sharp, cunning nails of the devil
shall not scratch off their shiny surfaces,
a tree branch shooting out strong leaves,
whereby the deepest recession of our life
glitters like a dot on the maps of a mess;
sounds of sorrow and gongs of grief,
thrusts through my ear like the voice of venom
when the malicious drop of our revolting tears
drowns the tingling songs of sorrowful birds
that builds a hedge of comfort in my ears,
and brings laughter within reach of my soul.

My name is Jonathan C. Ukah, a graduate of English and Law living in the UK. My poems have appeared in New Note Poetry, Compass Rose Literary Magazine, Ariel Chart International Press, The Pierian, Boomer Literary Magazine, Wildfire International Literary Magazine, and elsewhere. I am a winner of the Voices of Lincoln Poetry Contest 2022.