Redress

I want to understand what cannot be changed
and what will not redeem but resists
where un-mended fate cries out

I want to return to nights that failed
to flow in the lava of melted rocks
intransigent nights that gripped
hope between liver and grit

I must find the vein of patient redress
in the dash and flurry of hearts
too famished to follow their own beats
yet unwilling to stay still

I want to reach for the comely moon that insists
night after night on rousing the defeated
to raise scrapers afresh from jagged mountains

wherever I turn, I want to give the future a future
through unbroken will that cries out
for hearts that lose their beats but will not succumb.

by Odia Ofeimun (From his book A Boiling Caracas)

Odia Ofeimun