A poem about love and hope by David Tombale: Resurrecting

Resurrecting is about finding someone to save you.

Resurrecting

I have lost all reason and traded the inky

black of my rain swept skies for the sunny

gold of autumn, hibernating quietly while

she sits silently resting her hands on either

side of him.

The coldness of winter has often lived here,

winked its eye here and felt that the

sinking weight of my falling heart would

look far better frozen but sometimes I

disagree, many times a woman will sidle

up and rub her hands across that ice and

resurrect my beating heart,

fill these eyes with gifts of long black locks

and soft brown arms and someday she’ll kiss

these lips and impart the wisdom of being lost

only to be found.

A contemplative poem about love by David Tombale: Carousel

Carousel is essentially about treasuring the things that matter to you.

Carousel

I like to dream at night of the

fine black color of your hair,

the way you’d write me from

the farthest corners of our balcony,

of the sighing sound you’d make

when my fingers would tease the

ample contours of your hips and

I have sat you down and haven’t

found flaw enough to leave us

broken, to leave us strung out and

forgotten like polaroids and the

silence around that old carousel still

turning in the park, the swings fall

creaking to the ground, another signal

that will not let me down.

A poem about unrequited love by David Tombale: Heartbeat

This is another poem about unrequited love.

Heartbeat

There is a rhythm to her heartbeat,

a melody that makes a whisper in my ear

that resounds like echoes across the wide

blue yonder of our love, and I exist in

the spaces that other faces have hollowed out

and they I think might have loved her too,

once in silence and once in rage but nothing’s

left but pain.

I wish she’d write me,

I wish she’d live inside my heart

like thoughts I leave unspoken so

someday I’d leave them out to

run around the yard like our children,

with my eyes and her lovely smile,

I see them often, but have nothing to

content myself with this lonely night.

A poem about unrequited love by David Tombale: Memory

In some cases the people we love no longer can or will return our feelings and situations like that are the inspiration behind this poem.

Memory

In the soft embrace of lover’s gaze

I see you, steady as the mountains

as beautiful as a summer breeze,

like the last notes of a symphony

that plays beneath the forest trees,

that of cicadas and foxes,

all is silence, all is beauty and memory

and with you I will always remember.

Writing the last lines in this awful

letter trying not to let her fade like

the fog outside my window, she flits

away and something inside me cries

while I’m trying not to let her because

I will always remember.

A poem about the wonders of Africa by David Tombale: Homecoming

Homecoming is about celebrating the beauty of Africa.

Homecoming

My heart swells with a love for

Africa, the thunder of drums

beneath the green canvas of tents,

the roar of lions across the rivers and

marshes, the swell of oceans that kiss

the hulls of oil ships crossing the

Horn of Africa, the rains across

the mountains that slap against

the skin, bracing and alive,

the jazz clubs, the night spots,

Africa why are we alive if not for your

music? Your Mandelas, your cruise ships,

your safaris,

the dreams of little black boys and

little black girls in their school clothes

speaking and rapping in Swahili and Zulu,

Afrikaans and Tswana.

Africa I am the last ship crossing the canal

yearning to run against the sands of foreign shores

but I will never forget you, your sweet morula,

the language of my fathers and mothers barefooted

and straining, tilling the hard soil for watermelons

and wheat.

Africa I see you on the backs of postcards

and upon the silver screen,

Africa I see you as my plane lands on

the tarmac in Oliver Tumbo or on

the runways of Sir Seretse Khama and

all these songs say,

“Welcome back.”

A poem about love and comfort by David Tombale: At the beside

One of the great things about love is that you can allow yourself to be vulnerable around the person you care for and that’s what this poem is really about.

At the bedside

Stifle my grief, when the noonday

tides of passing cars bring with them

an outpouring of memories and tears,

when the heavy weight of sheets

and linen crowd me in, burying me

beneath the clogging scent of roses

smelling sickly sweet upon my bedside

table, she sits with me,

she waits with me while the tired cries

of the neighbor’s cat keep me up at night,

she soothes my fears.

A poem about contemplation on a Monday morning by David Tombale: Above the clouds

Above the clouds is about that Monday mood when you’re still in your covers and random thoughts pass through your mind.

Above the clouds

There is a shallow cough that builds

beneath the breast, almost like the

spirit yearns to be rid of this tender

flesh and I am waking, dreaming only

of the summer when the sun sits

high above the clouds and does nothing

more than glare. 

A poem about love and desire by David Tombale: Into the night

Into the night is about the idea of taking the one you love by the hand and leading them to a place where you can both be free.

Into the night

Graceful arch of neck bid me enter,

bid me shelter beneath your warmth,

your loving touch, your dark embrace,

your kisses ripen like a peach and I ache,

I burn to suckle upon your sweetness,

beneath the shade of your father’s porch

the distant tail lights of a passing truck

carry our love beyond the city limits

where these prying eyes won’t witness,

where I can look upon you in the glow

of the overhead lights as the needle peaks

and we flee out into the night.

A poem about love and longing by David Tombale: Across our window

Sometimes there is a certain tone to the way we remember people from our pasts, with a type of longing and that’s what this poem is about.

Across our window

There is a hollow ring to the way she speaks

my name, not like you, not like you did in

the last moments before the light bulb dimmed

and we were only silhouettes entwining,

one form into another against the white glow of

moonlight across our window. 

A poem about love and death by David Tombale: Enough

Death leaves behind all kinds of questions including whether a heart can ever heal after losing someone and that’s what Enough is about.

Enough

Years from now when we come to place

flowers by your window I’ll beg you to

replace it, this stain on your mother’s

heart, she hasn’t slept in months and

your school clothes hang unwanted in her

closet, gray skirts and white shirts and

this odd image of you laughing with your

friends.

The summer winds have blown here,

have barely ruffled this frightful heat but

the winter blues have settled, have set

themselves like a feline by our door,

smoothing it’s night black hair and fixing

it’s gaze upon our tears like sorrow.

There is a coolness outside like a storm is coming,

like the rains might tarry above the city,

might bring a refreshing wind to blow aside these dire days.

Some years from now when we think of you

I wonder if some new love will come along to

replace the one I’ve loved and will that new love

ever be enough?