1. River of Hope
Going to school is something that no one talks about.
Dropping out has become the right choice between heaven and hell.
Have you ever been asked to shout
In a dark room filled with stories to tell?
I wonder what’s going to happen to us
When girls don’t fear for spending the whole day in a boy’s room?
What about us, boys who give them pregnancy
Yet, we can’t take care of ourselves?
How can a child raise another child?
Do you see?
If geographers were right to say that the earth is round,
Spinning around till it reaches you on the ground.
Life doesn’t befall in anyone’s hands with sound.
Stand and start working to mound
For you can break its walls and mend to bound.
Jesus dives in the river of hope
Purifying you to cope
With all aspects of life.
You won’t starve to death or be killed by knife
Get away from what will lead you in abyss.
Stay and lay your mind with peace,
Walk in footprints of God
Who doesn’t leave his loved ones sad.
I preach to drive demons’ outrage,
I teach to empower people of all ages,
I write to expose the evils the world enacts,
I speak to raise what’s been shuffled.
2. Ubuntu
Fraternidade,
Another day has come,
A day full of hope
That ignites lonely world.
The sky is blue, clear and light
Love is the cure that heals
The wounds of heart
Rotting to perish.
It’s the transformer of pains
To feelings of comfort
That strengthens the displaced.
Care should be given
Without consideration for the familiar
Or strange,
For it’s the solute diluting depression.
It brings hope
Where there is no happiness.
There is a song of charity
Creating rhythms of symphony.
Sounds like the twilight of the stars,
We, orphans, long to hear
We, refugees, long sing
We, hopeless, long to embrace
We, widows, long to listen
The beauty of Africa lies in Ubuntu.
I can see the rainbows as the sun sets,
Sunrays splitting through the thatched huts,
Shadows of hatred sliding down
As hasty as mountainous muds
For fraternity floods and overflows African lands.
Children chilling and chasing around
For education is given to the helpless
Without discrimination or segregation,
But with motivation, compassion and commitment.
Their dedication to the needy
Saves swam of lives.
I can’t fly without you
I can’t breathe in your absence
For you’ve have taught me how to love,
How to care,
How to play.
I wonder how you paddle me in this cradle
Your tenderness tricking down my eyes,
Puddling on my face like happy tears.
You give us courage,
You enlighten philosophy of humanity.
Psychosocial refreshes our minds
I’ll die holding onto your hand.
God and angels will celebrate with you
If my mouth will open,
I’ll tell the heaven to be good with you
From cradles to the graves
For you also deserve endless life.
I am because we are,
This makes us together.
Uniting our hands for one
Separating will make us apart.
I am because we are.
Library without books
Is a hole without moles.
Ubuntu unites all in one forever.
Let’s be grateful for their presence.
I’ve been writing beyond my age
For my life is the whole stage
Whose actors are pain and joy,
But the audience is you.
Bio of the Poet: Charles Lipanda Mahigwe is a writer, poet, author and performer in Slam Poetry from Our talents, our advocacy festival, Tumaini Festival and Zomba City Festival. He was born on 2nd July 2005 in DRCongo. The Congolese poet is also optimistic. He proved this mostly in his poetry where he writes about hope, dream and future. He is one of the founders and the president of African Youth Artistic Poetry – AYAP where children and youth are trained for poetry and one of the organizers of our talents, our advocacy festival.