
Poem: Dispirited Soul
By: Learnmore Edwin Zvada
You come down on me
With an incessant inrush of fists that disables my jaw
The lips you used to kiss, darling, you have bruised
The body you used to caress is defaced and mottled
Now you cannot even look at me without grimacing
Like you have tasted rotten barf in a coffee cup
I cannot afford the luxury of weeping
Not with our little Angel sitting on my lap
I cannot let her see my pain and grief
I am her strength when she is weak
I am her ululation when she has aced her grades
I am a mother, the strongest she knows
No, I can’t succumb to tears
If only you knew, darling
How your fist dismantles my pride as a woman
How useless I feel when you call me names
Retard, whore, uncultivated village girl!
I take it all, silently, like a sheep before the shearers
Love…what a paradoxical phenomenon
On which I hang my wedding vows
Till I am blue in the face
Such a shame
Equally shameful as you playing the sweet lover
So you brought me a birdie and a crocodile tear
You must be genuinely sorry, right?
Perhaps I have abused my office as your woman
Forgive my social deportment, good old husband
Even though you smell like a gluttonous pig
I will wrap myself around you with a smile and a kiss
Your left eye squints like that of a thieving pedophile
But before such disturbing a gaze, I will strip
my soul and body
So that you may feast on me and be done with your
sexual profanity
My emotions will run wild but I will eventually put them
down to sleep
Hoping that my heart has withstood your piercing vocabulary
one more time
Hoping that you brought me love instead of a horsewhip
Lest they lock me away in one of the village madhouses