Philo Ikonya - Publications

The Courage to Stand | Alexsa Consulting coaching for leadership excellence and outstanding results Cheryl Esposito welcomes Philo Ikonya of Kenya, a human rights activist, social change motivator, ardent poet, writer and lecturer. Philo holds postgraduate degrees in the Arts, and consults on gender, governance and media issues. Friday November 10, 2017 10:00 am

That here the rain has fallen and soothed earth and heart, but still, Mama has not come home.
I don't know where She is we are looking for her
Spotlights and the light of the moon have a silent conversation
and whisper to bulbs planted in this land that flowers
amaryllis of a deep red variety
Am not dumb, I just keep my secret still like GK's Donkey...
So that the shout above my ears hears itself...
".....Fools! Scourge, deride me..."
Mama is coming to meet us to take us safely home...
"I keep my secret still...." GK

Droplet

and for you
for whom the droplet
has become an ocean of
pain, they say statistics
of disease, we send our hearts
all torn and still beating...
We must win this battle together
Droplet to droplet of tears of fever
high, may our river fill with hope
until the rising sun makes rain fall again...

"Here the sun is laughing in the winter... really, it smiles at me and ........
becomes so large that the white earth gives in to my joy.... It is happiness of nature united in soul in rhythm with the dance of creation... in such a moment, I must have been born! It is the 6th so my first day full day on earth was on 7th... an eternity brought me and smiles at me in the sun in the line of the 9... Nines... so I do really enjoy life, even in silence! Happy Birthday if you share this day as yours of birth!

in change, I first, if I trust
In dust ask light so darkness
retreats --- Smile...
in dusky dawn light wins twice PI 2020

"Friendship multiplies joy and divides sorrow and work liberates time" a philo ikonya - publications proverb (empowered by Africa)

Paths of peace

(For St Joseph a thought from the rough edge of the saw)
19.03.2019)

The path of peace calls for fasting
Fasting? But I have nothing to eat...
Had no roof....Over my head that night
and am a carpenter
The fast was long....and now...
Fasting from that word ....those terrible words
that bad look given to humans and animals
I caressed my donkey, you know the ox
looked on kindly
Fast from
that bad look given to humans and animals
Trees: They are our lungs and prayers in the wind..
Nature in all its forms...needs tenderness

So the worst of that look is plastic. Thrown all over....Return to things that rot.... or become dust. Return to yourself, the one self that knows that everything it has is a gift...never injures another.... Then you will have something to eat...Philo Ikonya

Fire fall
as rain? Oh no!
Let
a time be when clouds
be fresh tears
meeting
us gently in your breath
for We love you!

They asked her

She answered
PAUSE

I sing a
frequency so high
no machine, no human
can record...
and see...(see what?)

they only pay
for things they see
touch and feel...these fail here..
And, I, Am free

So let me sing inaudible
eat invisible but divisible
sleep sometimes
and dream
letting light give birth
to light
concaving ...
Search me without
torches

Philo Ikonya©

without words in worlds so different
how would you articulate? And yet
signs, the language all human share
is powerful. Thank you Cheryl Esposito
sharing again, this interview. It suprises
me, so your work is great. Linda Cracknell Linda Alepin Linda Ashok Linda Kazibwe-James Linda Ochiel Thanks to Linda Cracknell for this photo... and hey, is time to do a new one! I don't have one!

The Courage to Stand | Alexsa Consulting coaching for leadership excellence and outstanding results Cheryl Esposito welcomes Philo Ikonya of Kenya, a human rights activist, social change motivator, ardent poet, writer and lecturer. Philo holds postgraduate degrees in the Arts, and consults on gender, governance and media issues. Friday November 10, 2017 10:00 am

All wail
ire and Love...
Baby Pendo is gone
Not only women
refuse to be comforted...
Ire and Love
Baby Pendo is gone...Baby Love...
Too deep a wound, Baby Pendo...
I want to say something, but to who, and why... then how?
The words keep coming back to me... like stars refusing to stick in the sky...Or fire release sparks to their own end
Truly this is one dark night when even eyes fail light... You should heal us in your innocence but then again,
Why did someone do this to you, Baby Pendo
Why? Who? How?
Lord, am I sorry enough?
Compassion...Mercy...
Love that is ire...

O mench!

There is Cloth left over
from Muslim women's veils
Get it free, free, free!
Frei! Europa ist Frei!
Free! Europe is free!

O mench!

Europe's girls are free in hot shorts?
and every leg thick or thin yanked out
Trousers curves and carvers
Wrong match, play on!

O Loite!

Open hairy chests and legs march
in other muscle...Heart withdrawn
from history

Seelen

Spiritual obesity on the rise
call it what you will.... but..
Calc European Parliamentary time and money
on Burkini and all veiling...

Now that some Muslim women have
uncovered their eyes in most of Europe
What will you see, what will they see?

Cover your navels? Their every part actually
Am tired...of
attention on Burkini and veils...
Spiritual obesity on the rise...

I heard that... "There is a terrible propensity towards violence in the world born of hate (4letter word), calamity world .. and MANY prayers, actions for peace born of Love (4letter word)." Choose your 4 letters wisely and plan action!

Reading in Vienna... tonight. "There is a time for everything" Ecc.... to those who know our different interests... and how hard it is to write without 'I' or, 'Yo' 'Me' 'Ich' 'Jeg' "Io" 'Mimi" Ego, ego... ego... iii niii? all the time... How do you say "I' in your language? Add it here? Thanks.

May stays and plays... readings

http://examined-life.com/interviews/yvonne-owour/

Yvonne Owuor — Examined Life Owuor is a Kenyan writer who won the Caine Prize for African Writing for her short story ‘The Weight of Whispers’, and the Jommo Kenyatta Prize for Literature for her novel ‘Dust’, which was also short-listed for the Folio Prize in the UK.

What a name? Kritya surprised me... It just chews like something literary... no idea! http://www.kritya.in/0911/En/editors_choice.html

Kritya :: Editors-Choice Philo Ikonya Eye, the home of Justice From the anthology, This Bread of Peace Lapwing UK 2010 The eye is the home of justice peace and more Mystery Mine wanted to lock with innocence before I met this presence I am Umvundla in Xhosa a kliff springer in my own language male and female equal height At...

Rwanda ndagukunda, Kontra hate, Love... by Philo Ikonya

Violence traverses years... and our love?

I felt so innocent ...When P. Francis in 2017, apologised for the role religious persons played in the genocide in Rwanda in 1994. Where I was, we went on pointing fingers... "You see, they... they... they..." Violence does not disappear...the apology is relevant, and indeed atonement. Of course what they did is beyond words. I do not need to say beyond belief because I saw it in the museums in Rwanda... and it is real, no imagination needed. Repulsive. If we were alive then, what was our contribution? What are we doing now that shows us what our role would have been or could be in such an event?

Seven Sorrows Of Mother Mary in the News, Eternal Prayer A Mother who will not settle in Heaven without us BRINGS her Heart to us, burning with Love. The Immaculate Heart of Mary is pierced by our hard hearts.

bengali poet - rabindranath tagore - 1916

Grant that I may not be a coward,
feeling Your mercy in my success alone;
But let me find the grasp of Your hand in my failure

bengali poet - rabindranath tagore - 1916

Mourn with St Petersburg...Monday 03.04.2017
violent deaths this day...
children men and women..
May peace be their awakening!

and note coat of woman

Standing by underground... her shaken self, no pose...
Now this coat torn into two
by a blast in St. Petersburg this morning
is an emblem of tragedy of earth...
Torn into two, hearts shattered to pieces
I remember that curtain....
It is a tear that the world knows too well
if I shout Peace, come, Peaceful One delay not
Please hear me, and you.... Pray.

Philo Ikonya

Hearing, I heard...
I heard you passed by
with no footsteps
You whispered without lips
No face...
slipped on and went on...
blowing like never any wind had
breezing hope... in a storm

To Philo Ikonya

They had just read This Bread of Peace, my first poetry anthology.., and I should have danced all night....but continued walking barefoot... and sackcloth clad...

You are a dancing spirit over pebbles and oceans.
A living light in the form of a woman.
A peacefull breeze over the human cheeks.
A fire sitting in a soul smiling.
Thanks to the universe who has created such a wonder.
The earth is singing thank you for your steps
Blessed are the stars with such a spirit around.
We hear your song through all eternity.

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

I lost these words, or so I thought till I found them tucked away in my Page Notes today. Sent to me in 2011 from Azadeh and Rannov... When I should have danced all night... Where are they now? But the words remain. I found them too intimidating to share... and now... that I have just read them again... Still... hmmm! I have to say am just discovering...But I did write about oceans endlessly... in Invincible Nubia-Adios Lampedusa. You never heard of it did you? My publishers are the peaceful breeze....calm seas....


Med hilsen og takk for diktsamlingen fra
Azadeh og Rannov

If you legalise it, does
it legalise you?

They say if you legalise it
then it pays and everything
is clean and you know, plant
trade and sell... on the streets...
or just kill silently...
if you legalise it...
But if you legalise it, does it
legalise you?

Edith Stein...in her poem to God the Father...

"Bless the joyous ones, O Lord, and keep them under Your Wing.--
My mourning clothes You never yet removed."

Edith Stein touches me profoundly... did not know she wrote poems... Just searched a poem by Edith Stein, out of the .... blue?

A Poem by St. Edith Stein I really must get a copy of the Science of the Cross ASAP. Unfortunately, as those who have families and small children know, there is little left over for such indulgences.

Silence that grows

You go
flourish in silence
Live with words
unspoken
Written or breathed
they are food
Eat what you will
Measure? Whisper...
They nourish
what you can't
in silence...

Lift me life ...

Wounded Friend
I beg you for so much
then I offer you thirst
and when you quench me
I turn desert
I begin to take all that you gave me back:
Life, Water, living, Air, Bread and
Trees
Back from you and others and then
What shall I offer You at dawn?
Tomorrow is dying... Come again
over Water?
PI 09.03.2017

Philo Ikonya

And after violence
of time stolen
she says:
'I have come to raise
my lamp to the sky
so that listening silent
I can own yearnings explore'
The class is mute
On she goes... calling...
Baring heart to the sound
of the commandment 'gainst
Ethnicism in the
powers within the Ten
No word, no tweet
And all are mute now
sea waves talk to rocks in silence...

Thanks Ishraga... Published in The Netherlands in Arabic... Great world...from which I wrote .. Sings the Owl... It is great to see my poems in Arabic, thanks to Ishraga Mustafa Hamid... a poet too.
http://www.ila-magazine.com/%D9%81%D9%8A%D9%84%D9%88-%D8%A5%D9%83%D9%88%D9%86%D9%8A%D8%A7-philo-ikonya.html

فيلو إكونيا Philo Ikonya فيلو اكونيا، شاعرة وروائية كينية، تعيش حاليا في النمسا ولها عدد من الروايات والمجموعات الشعرية. من مؤسسي القلم بكينيا.