U-MELENI: HOME
My name is U-MELENI . This is my real name, it is ndebele/zulu name meaning " what are we waiting for?".I am from Zimbabwe and proud of my shona/ndau-ndebele/zulu roots.In our culture,names are sacred and are the compass with which you create your path. My art is my journey, my reason.
My mission as an Artist is to inspire, to motivate, to agitate into right thought and right action, to heal, to educate and elevate. I hope you may find words of encouragement, words that speak to your soul. Thank you for your continued belief in my Art. I am honored to be sharing my God given gifts with you."
I am a POET first and from there I have and continue to evolve.So enjoy this visual food I have for your minds palete.
LOVE & LIBERATION POEMS:
~HOME~
Our bodies are our homes
We carry with us
blood, tissues,cells
memories braided by age and time
We become
We become at our own pace
and our bodies remember
***************************************************
~In LOVE WITH MYSELF~
( a permission poem for all women)
i want to fall in love with myself
with no apology
romance my mind with knowledge
and exhaust myself with endless exploration of my thoughts
i want to dance naked in the sunlight of my dreams
revel in being supreme
divine
I want to be surreal
patient and pleasantly waiting for my purpose to prevail
i want to fall in love with myself
live my life as if its the greatest song
send myself an ocean of flowers
sing myself to sleep
snuggle up to my girl child self
whisper in her ears " i love you"
and remind her she has wings and she can fly HIGH
i am learning to love myself
really llve myself
working on my faults
celebrating my strengths
knowing all of this makes me the woman I am
I am loving myself
falling in love with mysellf
loving me to the CORE.
**********************************************************
~DEFINITION OF LOVE~
The other night
Crisscrossed on your lap
I circled your waist like a belt
With my caramel legs
Nervously looked into the gentle pools of your face
And I let you see me
For the first time
For the first time I was brave enough to touch you
Lifting wings to see scars now old
Branded on your coffee skin
I read you story like Braille
Your words were the sound track
My finger tips breathe
And understand languages of pain
I was afraid
Yet
Unafraid
Wanting to yet not wanting
To want you in ways I cannot yet understand
But I take a risk
And show you the imperfection that is me
My right side scars
And I tell you the story of my wounds
Inside I am reeling as I recall the details
But you
The man that you are
Look at me
Lift my shirt as if you are touching God
And place a sacred kiss
And I begin to feel.
*******************************************************
LOVE IS NOT SUPPOSED TO HURT!
Sometimes
I wish
I could punch out your eyes
Like orbits
see how far you would go
Once blind
You who gave me love
Blinded me
Sometimes
I wish I could punch your stomach
Kick your uterus
Then ask you to the Mother of Nations
Look in my eyes
Do you see my frustration?
You rape me your vulgar words
And then you simply smile and climax
Using sIN-TAX
The way your fantasize as you chisel memories on my
Black virgin skin page
You touch my cheek with serrated fingertips
And leave skid marks on my brown hips
You smile at me
And tell me that this is the sweetest taboo
That this is the sweetest thing called LOVE
To me this stinks
It’s time for me to be FREE
It’s time for me to love me more than you
Because love is not supposed to HIT
Love is not supposed to HURT
Love is not supposed to HURT!
*******************************************************
~BLU~
My eyes are glued
My mouth nailed shut
Can’t talk
Scream or shout
I’m living blu
I fake a smile coz that’s all I can do
Sadness not an option to show on the canvas of my face
Raping myself without even touching myself
Scorching my mind with fear
She said “it’s not polite to cry”
I should feel appropriately
A shadow of me projected to the world
Inside a scared
Scarred little girl
Stretching me across oceans and seas
Stretching my heart inappropriately
But now I tell
And I tell
And each time I fell
A piece
Of
Me
Breaks
Free
From chains of forced non-intimacy.
****************************************************
~TRUTH~
I wanted to capture for eternity this love, this joy, this bigness I feel. I envision my children someday bathed in love, fed love, dressed in love, pinning bows of love in my daughter’s hair, and brushing my son’s hair with love. My family would be drunk of this thing called love. I am no longer afraid to feel this way therein lies the possibility of bliss. It’s his fault HE inspires me so. My very cells ache to multiply someday in womb. We two can take the world by storm. He and I in my eyes are our own universe. I smile ,recall visions of he and I lying in my Queen size bed. It feels as wide as an ocean, and I don’t even feel seasick. While we sleep, our feet kiss, and I am reminded in my dreams why I love this man. We sleep naked and innocent. Content. We make love and cross into new dimensions of space. Our bodies sing psalms and I feel forgiven for sins I have committed in past lives. I feel reborn, changed, baptized. And the thing that matters to me more than if this love will last a lifetime, is that my body and soul remember this bliss and his kiss. That I will remember the way he looks into my mind and lets me speak even if it doesn’t make sense and I repeat myself. That I will remember our intimate conversations about how we were raised, about the wounds we carry, the ones we’ve lost, the things we regret, the people we have loved, the dreams we have. With Him I have jumped out of the plane, not caring if I have a parachute knowing that the greatest gift I can give is being myself. Authentically.They say that distance makes you feel more connected to someone.But I miss him, like I miss rainbows, like I miss my favorite toy when I was a baby. I miss him, the way the soil must miss rain, the way an instrumental misses lyrics, the way a song longs for a singer to bring feelings to life. He is. That’s all I can say. He is and when its all said and done, the fundamental question I will be asked is who did you love? And for me I can say that I loved someone.
********** ***********************************************
BLACK WOMAN
Breaking barriers with words and deeds
Planting seeds in minds
With time
You shook foundations to the core
Educated more and more black souls
And as you RISE
So RISE we
People kissed by the Sun
Heaven blessed
We bow and acknowledge ancestors sweet caress
In the way we do what we do
We celebrate YOU
Beautiful Black woman
Gifted and strong
Worthy of all praise
Wisdom that rights wrongs
Anthem to every song
You lift generations
Steady feeble hands with grace
Head held high
Facing ignorance with pride
They step aside
Illuminated by your strength, your dedication, your style
Your values you won’t bend
Your talents – a unique blend
Beautiful Black woman
Gifted and strong
Worthy of all praise
Wisdom that rights wrongs
Anthem to every song.
*****************************************************
chocolate skin
dipped in african gold
skin so smooth
miracle to behold
the way his lips move
Puts me in a groove
He doesn’t even know
I feel this way
What would he say?
Would he look at me possibly
As Mother Africa
And together we
Can build
A new world
********************************************************
LOVE.COM
soothing sunkissed mahogany frame with the mind of ten thousand Queendoms, the softness of a gentle breeze, the innocence of a child's kiss, the daring nature of a thunderstorm, fluid like a mountain stream, loving like stars blessing the skies, giving like a mother to child, poet like no other..... I want a man that would make my soul smile, who listens with his whole body, who laughs and is open, who is gentle and assured, a man who is sensitive & strong, a man who loves to dance, and loves sweet kisses in the morning, a man who loves to hug, a man who loves to play and doesn't take himself too seriously, I want a man strong enough to have a woman in his life who is an Artist and can appreciate her need for space, a spiritual man who knows that there is more to life than material things, a man who loves nature and the simple things, a man who loves to travel, and make me happy, a man who has his own dreams and is working towards it, A man willing to be bathed in love, a man ready for commitment, a man ready for a friend. a man who is honest, a man who is not jealous, a man who loves to cook as much as he loves to eat, a man who loves music, slowdances, enjoys week-ends in bed, enjoys poetry, is open to the Africa in me. I am looking for a King to rule with......I am looking for my soul's bliss....
&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&.
I want to be born
I want to be born
But who is brave enough to birth me
I want to be born but who is strong enough to love me
Brave enough to free me
I want to be born
I want to be born
Maybe I need to be strong enough to birth myself.
all text on my website by U-Meleni Mhlaba is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.