THE GREAT ONES by Heather Covington

Poetry Tribute to The Great Ones Infusionary Renaissance: Ode To The Great Ones

I am great, and magnificent!

I am a woman of pride and confidence.

I am a soul living on this earth!

My quest in life is unrehearsed!

Do you know why I am so great...

Do you know why I am so magnificent..

Do you know why my soul lives on this earth...

Do you know why my quest is unrehearsed...

There is Maya, the lady whose name is Angelou

There is Nikki, with a touch of Giovanni whose poetry speaks to you...

There is Amiri, a noble warrior with the strength of the sea...

And a note from Tim Everett that speaks to me...

There is Denise "Daily News" Campbell magnificent like the wind...

Terry A. O’Neal who will remind you over and over again...

There is Delores who is a poet, Great God...I know it...

And Raul Maldonado, bless the day when he shows this...

Dale Drakeford is my mentor, a gift sent from heaven,

And Cynthia Highsmith Hooks, awards? She’s winning seven!

Dwight Carson is a master with the most....

Omar Tyree is just a leader, Lord let him be the host...

Br burns is spoken and heard like a fine bird...

The Journey To Timbooktu crew must be heard...

Def Jam Poets, you are more than just a Tony...

Dawn Rodriguez, you are real, and every one has told me...

Sonia, your grace is like a lady of nobility,

and Cheikh Omar, if it wasn’t for you, no one would know me...

Max, you are the greatest, and your poetry will shine on this day...

Those who support literary artists and poets, are paving the way...

Yolantha, you are missionary with a poetical quest...

And Cliff, I always knew you were the best...

Himoruko, you shine like a African King of long ago...

And this is why...my poets ... I truly love you so...

Dee Freeman and Pam Osbey your soul is a lot like me,

and in dedication of Langston Hughes & Lawrence Wayne, here’s a gift from me...

You are the great ones,

and for more on the way, I will adore,

See poetry fuels my soul, and

gives me the strength to give more!

I bless the ground of great poets and

May the great ones continue to live on!



©Copyright 2001- 2006. Heather Covington. All Rights Reserved. Contact publisher for permission to use. 1.718.547.0499

POETRY: DREAM TUNE LADY by Heather Covington

Dream Tune Lady



As a child, I often dreamed of things that were unreachable

like the moon, stars, and comets in the sky

As a child, I often dreamed of family

like Mother, Daddy, Sister and Brother

As a child, I often dreamed to speak

like an actress, anchor woman and radio announcer

As a child, I often dreamed of friends

to support, love and accept me the way I am

As a child, I continued to dream

and then one day my dreams were shattered

My broken ghetto, family, and friendships

fell just when I thought I had caught my dreams

I asked myself what had I done wrong

and did I deal the hand of fate just dreaming?

Then, a wounded bird with limp wings

perched itself next to the nape of my neck whispering...

Your dreams were never in vain, and although it seems so

you will make what was broken better someday

but only with someone who never doubts you,

is loyal and believes...and believes in YOU!

Copyright 2004. Heather Covington

Poetry: LOVE by Heather Covington

Love

by Heather Covington (CEO/ Publisher of Disilgold Soul Magazine)

"I dedicate this poem to Edith Holmes, this remarkable lady who wrote a novel named, "Pressions. Her heart is like mine."



Love....love....love...what is love?

Is love the admiration people show you when you make it to the top?

Or is love the subtle steps of support you receive along the way?

Or is love the advice and direction you’re offered before you take your first step?

Or is love appreciation and acceptance for just being you?

Love..Love...Love....what is love?

Is love the hurt and pain your loved ones transfer to you?

Or is love the deceit and lies you deserve because your goals are true?

Or is love the obstacles designed to make you stronger?

Or is love a blank letter that gets longer and longer?

Love...Love...Love...what is love?

Is love every good deed you do because you care?

Or is love the things you cannot do because you are fair?

Or is love a mountain of power only reserved for a few?

Or is love a whisper that sings a glorious tune?

Love....love...love...I know what love is?

Love is the wind that gently cascades through my thick black long hair

and evaporates the dew from my eyelashes on a hot humid day

Love is the sun that bakes my cherry painted toes

Soakin’ up the browness of my caramel skin like simmering bronze ice

reddening my face like Georgian red clay

Love is rain that falls on the nape of my neck

Trickling down to the center of my belly

Like a Nubian Crater reminiscent and filled with sacred waters

like an African River from long ago

Love is like my sister, brother, mother and father who

love me unconditionally

Accept me for who I am because we are blood born

And simply because we’re all we got , and so...

Love is eternal,

Love is a poem,

Love is a story,

Love is a song,

Love makes you do crazy things like.... like...turn to a stranger sitting next to you....go ahead...turn to a stranger next to you...now I dare you to look that stranger in the eye...

Now release your anger, bitterness, prejudice and judgement and say...

I love you....

That is love... That is love...That is love!

GOD SENT KATRINA TO TEST THE WORLD by Heather Covington

GOD SENT KATRINA TO TEST THE WORLD
©2005. Heather Covington.

Just yesterday I had a parish on the borders of New Orleans, Louisiana,
a beautiful state with green pastures, warm folks smiling and my friend, the sun.

How it had shone its exuberant rays beyond the sea and lifted me up from my deepened sleep to awaken and arise each day along with the hot humid air that cascaded through my window blinds.

How I loved the sun’s rays that touched my shoulders and spoke to me with heat-filled light that let me know that all would be fine and beckoned me to just ride out the storm and be brave.

On an August day, I obeyed the sun and stayed behind the doors of my parish that I boarded with wooden planks on my own and shameless pride because I was fearless and survived Camille in 1969.

I believed and trusted the sun who said, “I will be right back to protect you, just stay safe,gather your children, pack away some food and if a flood transcends, just await in the attic, and so I obeyed.

In a few days, the storm came with furor and unbiased grace to sweep over New Orleans and speak a silent song with a forsaken tongue that introduced itself like a forceful wind without purpose or reason for choosing its path.

The storm defied the sun’s promise and stared at me straight in the eye and warned me to leave,
but I spoke back, and said, “I am ready for you, oh great one, and you will not destroy my home.”

At that moment, a strong wind blew and mentioned that her name was Katrina.
She said she did not pity the human race, nor cared about color, one’s creed, gender or race, just death!

Katrina told me not to take it personal as she broke my windows sending shingles of sharp glass through my home that impaled my first born, killing her instantly within my arms.

I had no time to cry. My child was instantly dead. I cried to the top of my lungs, “Oh God!
Please help me! No one heard my cries, just Katrina who strengthened her merciless power with each cry.

Katrina’s wind pushed us up to the attic. I wrapped my youngest born in a blanket and trudged through an immediate flood that began to rise beyond the height of the electrical outlets in my home.

I feared that I would be electrocuted, and as I retracted up the ladder to the attic.
I stubbornly held a hand radio and listened to a news reporter beckoning the town to leave within the next 24 hours, but I had no car.

My husband had gone out of town to work. I was simply alone and afraid. My children hovered with me in the hot attic without light, and plenty of insects that longed to dwell in damp and dark places.

I slowly pulled up the attic door and took one last breath of life in knowing that my life was over.
There was only one oval window that faced the world from its confines and barely big enough to get through.

My fear caused me to sing a hymn by Mahalia Jackson as tears faltered through my eyes.
My children remained quiet and confused as the water had finally seeped above the attic floor level.

My children and I slept in the water, and very unlike the soft down comforters we nestled in with our central air-conditioning and smooth 600 thread count pre-cal sheets I was so proud to own a week ago.

Now I had nothing, not even food. My dead child consumed my reasoning and thinking. My children still remained quiet as the water rose. We would be dead by morning if we did not go out.

So I grabbed a hard object I found under the pool of water on the floor attic and broke the window pane of the attic. The glass shattered. I stuck my head through the hole and cut my cheek.

My children screamed and panicked in seeing the blood on my face, but I had to see if there was clearance above the roof. I had to convince my oldest and most reluctant child to squeeze through the window. The water rose above my waist.

My kids cried from the outside for their mama as Katrina’s winds blew.
I managed to whittle my way through the small attic window and embrace my babies.

Everything was floating and our house was submerged in a sea of tainted waters and chemicals.
If I had not gotten my family out, we would have drowned. Now I hold on to my babies as my home’s roof top floats like an island lost in a sea.

“Why God, why God!” I cry along with my babies. The night was long. We all awoke the next day and feared for our lives as alligators surrounded our roof top that became embedded by a hill.

I grabbed my children and walked through the waters with my two children floating by their necks next to each of my hips. “Just keep your heads up honey.” We approached grounds that were at knee level.

The rawness of the water had numbed my feet and I begged my kids to leave me and keep walking until they found dry land, just keep walking. They refused and I had no choice but to keep walking.

It seemed as if we had walked for miles. Some helpful town folks told me to follow them but I begged them to just take my kids please, “I can’t walk any longer, I can’t!”.

My kids cried and held on to me, but I yelled at them with viciousness and they went with the strangers. I promised the strangers that I would follow soon and just need to rest on a log that floated with God’s hands.

I held on to the log for one more day. I drank the water around me in desperation and felt sick to my stomach. I could feel infection ravaging my stomach. I sensed heart failure as it beat with rare intensity.

There were no more tears left in me as I thought of the home I once lived in with my family and the warm smiles the sun’s rays brought to my children’s faces. My husband would be angry that I did not make it, but maybe happy that I had saved two of our kids.

I was alone and afraid. It was just me and the log floating in the torrid winds. The log suddenly was rude and turned suddenly to set me free without warning.

I talked to it and asked it to come back to me, but it floated further and further away. Katrina sat still for a moment and looked at me in the eye again. She did not smile. She did not blow her wind. She remained quiet and still.
The water had risen to my neck and suddenly lifted me to the point where my feet could not feel the ground. I felt the water go up my nostrils and seep into my mouth. I tried to not panic because then I would drown.

I had never floated a day in my life or learned to swim. God was holding my body above the water just long enough to face Katrina whose wrath was not completed yet. She still waited patiently.

I yelled at her, “WHY, WHY, WHY!” She still said nothing as she began to blow her wind mercilessly. I felt the water seep up to my eyes and I gasped for air one last time as I went under.


I slapped the water and lifted my head up over the water one last time and yelled, “You won’t win ! You won’t win! And- you better not harm my children because if I die....,” I said as water trickled down my mouth choking me...!” “You won’t live to see another day!”

My body plummeted to the bottom of the nowhere. I kept my eyes wide open as debris clouded my eyes. For a moment I could see and breathe under water. It was a world I had never seen before.

Katrina dove below just to stare at me until I closed my eyes. I finally closed my eyes and that’s when a whirlwind of water shifted me above ground.

I kissed the ground. God had placed me somewhere that did not really exist, but I was alive. Perhaps, my last thought of saving my kids had saved my wretched soul that longed to have materialistic things like a home. It must have been God’s last test and I passed it. He spared my life.

Katrina was gone and had left her mark with a yellow rose perched upon my face when I awoke, but for those who risked their own lives to save a child... right now they are in a better place. GOD SENT KATRINA TO TEST THE WORLD.

For those who passed the test, they will see the sun once more... they will see the sun once more.