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    The Journey Home
    The Journey Home
    The Journey Home
    Ebook124 pages45 minutes

    The Journey Home

    By Horace I. Goddard

    ()

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    About this ebook

    Calluses, calabash-big, are on my feet. Sugar in my veins sweetens my life. Salt preserves my flesh in this unrefrigerated land. I am woman Woe I am. Ise woman.

    In this mythical-poetic collection of verse, seasoned poet Horace Goddard shares vivid imagery and energetic language as he offers a bold, refreshing, yet introspective glimpse into an African Caribbean mans search for a home in the diaspora.

    As migratory man travels from place to place and establishes ties to the land, he nurtures a perpetual yearning for the land of his origin and often wonders, Where is home and how will I get there? In this new collection of poems, often penned in fable-like style, Goddard questions what home means, what culture means when a person is transplanted, and what race means in a country that is predominantly black or white.

    As Goddard offers a memorable lyrical journey from Africa to the Caribbean and finally to Canada, his poetry invokes emotions and nostalgia as he explores the differences in cultures and details his experiences as a traveler. It is through this celebrated poets eyes that many will truly understand what it is like to journey home.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisheriUniverse
    Release dateJan 17, 2011
    ISBN9781450273442
    The Journey Home
    Author

    Horace I. Goddard

    Horace I. Goddard was born in Barbados and currently lives in Dorval, Quebec, Canada. He is the author of ten books, many of which are poetry collections. He enjoys travelling, research, and writing. He is married to Patricia Dennison. Horace I. Goddard is a poet, fiction writer, and critic.

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      Book preview

      The Journey Home - Horace I. Goddard

      Contents

      I In Search Of Africa

      Primal Mother

      Connubial Bliss

      I Surrender All

      Cudjoe

      King Jah Jah

      Sikio

      Village Mother

      Worship

      Death by Default

      World Scope I

      A Long Way from Home

      Work Blues

      II Caribbean Rhythms

      On the Road to Dragon Bay

      Of Rivers

      Looking out to Sea at Morant Bay

      The Marriage Bed Unfolds

      Archival Birth

      This Rock is Home

      Shadows

      Searching

      Mirror

      Longing

      Wild Rose

      I Have Dreams

      Before Another Sunset

      Loneliness

      Shades of Care

      WINTER BLUES

      Oh, Give Me More

      Jamaica

      This is Jamaica Too

      Death Will Come

      Desex the Text

      When Hurt Has No Escape

      A Requiem for Spring

      The Song of the Dead

      Hurdles

      The Rainmaker

      Young Love

      Jolene

      Rum Shop Blues

      Midsummer

      Lamentation

      Still Thinking of You

      At the Water’s Edge

      The Growth of Friendship

      Refugee

      Dawn of Christmas

      World Scope II

      Anwar El Sadat(1919–1981)

      Summertime

      Soul in Silence

      Matrimony

      FOREDAY MORNING

      Give Me Time

      Voidancy

      A Ring of Silence

      Swan Street

      Seascape

      Sunrise

      Island Mother

      A Final Kiss

      Eventide

      Vesper

      Yellow Tear

      Ruptured

      Nature’s Seamstress

      The Little Things in Life

      Desire

      In Search of Self

      Town and Country: Same Difference

      III Canada in We

      Crack

      Canada Lies Within Me

      Who a Dem?

      Beat Racism

      Echoes of the Past

      ACKNOWLEDGMENT

      Several of these poems in this collection, or versions of them, have appeared in Kola. I would like to thank H. Nigel Thomas for his invaluable friendship and for reading the manuscript and offering emendations. My gratitude goes to Anthony Joyette, Clarence Bayne, Cyril Dabydeen, and Dr. Derrilyn Morrison for their encouragement. My wife, Patricia Dennison, is my critic and sounding board, and I thank her for her constant support.

      I In Search Of Africa

      Primal Mother

      Silent gourds of memory

      Hang from a whispering tree

      All covered with icicles

      That wrestle my mother’s image from me.

      I sit here remembering silent dreams

      And listening to plaintive voices

      "Ya plenty trees fuh curl

      Dah camera ’round!"

      Voice in; fade out.

      Zoom to sweet Ijeoma.

      She tells tales told to her of Africa

      Veiled in valleys of darkest solitude.

      Cannibalized poets sprout

      From her loins and wait to dip

      Their pens with venom to poison these pages

      While the world stands preaching promises.

      Here I stand with torrents of tempestuous words,

      Time bombs to tear down those wailing walls,

      To break open those borrowed monuments

      Whose necromancy bewitched the spider, Ananse!"

      Babylon despairs with every passing moment.

      Who a dem in Kingston

      Can avert this desolation?

      Out of different dust,

      One nation is born.

      One people in de capital

      Make holy noise in the ancients’ cathedral.

      Our grandcestors’ drums beat in tumult.

      Our once sacred songs are mute.

      Our rhythms lack the wiles of the shaman,

      Whose guiles tricked the dancers’ feet.

      If the tune of the flute

      Doesn’t resonate in this bamboo shoot,

      Do not blame this foreign mother.

      It is I who’ve lost the art of conjure.

      Connubial Bliss

      Bit by ritualistic bit,

      The couple sat at poolside cutting

      The bottom tier of the bridal cake.

      The groom purses his lips and

      Proclaims his love while he drinks

      Flowing tears from his lover’s cheeks.

      In the wedding crowd,

      One drunken, loud

      Voice above the band’s playing cried,

      "Bwoy ’im can’t last very long.

      ’Im used fo’ hunting a Westmoreland.

      Po’ thing! She is from England."

      The poet and I changed our drink

      From tonic and gin to whisky

      And water, stretching out our revelry.

      Night flowed into darkness.

      In the meantime, cerebral tipsiness

      Dulled each moment of bliss.

      The funeral pyre

      Ignites Miriam’s body,

      Bouncing shards of desire across the bed.

      In

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