Tag: love

The Second Thursday of Every Month

the-story-reading-ape

Be sure to tune into your favorite Ape the second Thursday of every month starting next month for my articles. Coming Up: “Enjoy the Journey”, Thursday, February 9, 2017 @ 01:100a London, UK Time.

Sometimes we need to slow down and capture the moment for what it is. Step outside of ourselves and see things play out as if we are not there. Then we can see our actions in their most genuine form, identify our mistakes and most especially, acknowledge those things we have accomplished. We spend a lot of time on what need to be done or should be done in order to reach that level of (place your career goals here) that we envision is representative of success that we do not take the time to appreciate the success we already have. Sometimes you don’t need to do anything. Just be still. Take the time to truly love what it is that you do. Enjoy the journey.

No Punctuation

Dear Love,

your voice is the sound of pages

I’ve been waiting to read my entire life

like run on sentences

in a book too perfect to end

tell me

how do you shackle power to punctuation

If I could

I would end this poem with a period

or place a comma in the places I need

to catch my breath

but you

will only rush to the tips of my fingers

you see love

will only leak

from the pores in my skin

like the sounds of many waters

flooding its way from Noah’s Ark

you shelter me

like an infant

carefully encased in its mother’s womb

before language existed

before there was ever a need of capital letters

dear captain

you chose us

before there was a thing called history

sucking at its mother’s breast

we are nurtured by the past

to understand the future

Dear Love,

you are the answer to every question

and the sound of your mercy

is the only thing worth setting my alarm clock to

so I’ve chosen to reverence you this way

with outstretched pieces of paper

and ink pens

and a medley of words

all purposed to form the letters of your name

all destined to sing your praise

with no punctuation

no commas

or periods

or apostrophes

just run on sentences

limitless

like sign language I don’t remember learning in Public School

and while my tongue clings to the roof of my mouth

while my heart waits

I’ll write you poems

in the form of prayers

on the palms of my hands

and I’ll leave them running

like fountains of compassion

overflowing the levees of thought

I’ll leave them open

unedited

unrevised

and grammatically incorrect

so you’ll read me

like you always do

and never forget what my heart looks like

with no punctuation

because all the world has ever needed

was love.

Convicted

think-backward-to-write-meaningful-metaphors

His beauty was biblical. Much more than a body, he was diary. He was journal. A standing column of poetry. From the top of his head to the bottom of his feet, this was prophecy. Thought the teacher was a waitress asked her if I could have another round of him. Let’s be realistic, this thing was futuristic like foresight. Every time he opened his mouth I took road trips into his memories. For my blood racing, I could not hide the joy. Trying to catch my breath after falling into his smile we were connected. Too young to understand this love-at-first-sight thing, I could have been dreaming. Maybe this was just my imagination. I was dancing. Moon-walking into complete relaxation. His last name should have been Jackson cause he was a hit. I couldn’t lie. Ran home every day just to go to bed so I can wake up to the sunrise because it reminded me of him. He didn’t know it but my nose was so open I took notes. I was singing. A sucka to every sound of the harmonious humility that escaped like convicts from his lips I was convicted, because I loved him too early.

Yecheilyah Ysrayl is the YA, Historical Fiction author of The Stella Trilogy, Blogger, and Poet. She is currently working on her next book series “The Nora White Story” about a young black woman who dreams of being a writer in The Harlem Renaissance movement and her parent’s struggle to accept their traumatic past in the Jim Crow south. “Renaissance: The Nora White Story (Book One)” is due for release spring, 2017. For updates on this project, sneak peeks of chapters, the pending book cover release, and full blurb for this series, be sure to subscribe to Yecheilyah’s email list HERE.

Hope Like Water

I must admit

I don’t know much about you

The first ocean in which I’ve ever swam

You were there in my mother’s womb

And every other home in which I’ve ever lived

I drink you

And you consume me

I cook with you

From pieces of your soul

I feed my children

And we bathe in your arms

Watching as you carry us

Water

Invisible

Yet nurturing

I know not what you are

Not exactly

I think you’re spiritual

Because you left your DNA in my skin

Your truth dripping as it clung onto my bones

Like breath of life escaping my lips

A misty cloud

A forehead kiss

Or a mother’s smile

And the world is yours to conquer

When she winks her eye

And you know you got this

You’re there to fulfill all our needs

A spiritual fluid

That man has not fully understood

Like heaven right here on Earth

Miracles

In the desert

If I could bottle hope

I imagine it’ll look something like you

If I could taste on my lips expectation

I imagine paradise would taste

Something like you

If truth could be wrapped up in one word

If hope could manifest itself

So we know what it looks like

I’d sum it up using one word

The only word with the power to both nourish

and destroy

To hurricane wrath

And to quench thirst

If I could touch the substance

of this expectation

I imagine it is hope

Like

Water.