ASHLEY MAWERE

Ashley Mawere

THE ESSENCE OF MEDICINE:

A DOCTOR'S TALE

Let my children sit around the evening fire as myths echo through the night

As generations come and go tell the tales so the youth may be inspired

Call upon the scholars to narrate our history and remember the names of the fallen

Hopefully with the turn of every page a child may dream again and change the world

Today they will call her a hero but their descendants will name her a legend

A legend whose flesh was untamed by sleep and immune to fatigue

A hero whose heart knew no borders and needed no passport to save a life

A chapter soaked in the essence of hope for an extra gasp and dub of the heart

The chronicles told by a dying man so that minds may bathe in the essence of medicine

Fathers clenched on to hope as the nightmares and gunshots kept them awake at night

but tell me ,who's shoulders will they cry on now that a plague stole their daughters?

When mothers fight to protect their babies from the sickness that preys by day,

who will protect them from the floods of tears when war steals their husbands by night?

Someone please give me a genie so I may wish this epidemic away but watch me closely for I might just wish myself away .

Away to a place where rivers of blood are no more than myths from an old man's lips

Away to moment that is not a season of fear where death blows wistfully like Santa Ana winds stripping me of friends like autumn leaves.

Dear reader I need you to hold my hand as a thousand fall on my right

Dear reader I ask of you to bear with me as I try to stitch a wound and save a life

Bear with me as I pour out the essence of hope

If I fall tonight tell the tale of how I tried and died

Tell them war was the art but medicine was the essence that drove our hearts

In this life riddle me this for in the next you may not riddle me that.

In my hands lives were saved , in my hands a life was lost

yet with my hands my own life could not be prolonged, who am I?

This is my tale so your minds may bathe in the essence of my life.

A life full of sacrifice , love and hope

The essence of medicine.

YOU PAT ME ON THE BACK

AND CALL ME A CHAMP

You smile at me and say well done to show me you're proud

You......

How about we stop the games or maybe play a game rated "H" for honest

How about we expose the rotten eggs since Easter has passed

You smile at me but i see your retracted fangs

Your acknowledgments sound so sweet but from your tongue drips corrosive venom

i'd call him a fool whosoever believes you are capable of changed

But i'm that fool coz i've been waiting for this day since you first heard me say mama or dada

I drop my guard because i understand you make mistakes like any human

but go ahead and betray me coz it's what humans do

Lure me in with a kiss  by day

If you speak at night your lips will have me hypnotized

Let's call it love so we can play a game of trust

I would love to brush off the pleasures so i can think clearly,

but the truth isn't blurry i just don't want to see it

My judgment is flawed because my mind is clouded by thoughts of you

Tell me you don't love the foreplay as my fingers caress the pieces till your broken heart is whole again

Undo my buttons and we'll play a game like all humans do

Play a game where you stab me in the back because betrayal is your art

if it's an art remind not to blame you because you only human

i let down my guard for you to betray coz i'm human too

My right cheek is red , my left one is numb

i believed in second chances but don't expect me to offer them a third

I was taught about faith but this time i need the evidence to be seen

If i hid my heart would you blame me?

If i murdered my emotions would you arreest me?

Maybe if i played with a heart(mind) or two i would understand

I know it's wrong but i'm willing to convince myself it's right

Forgive this prodigal son to whom you breathed new life

Save me from myself because even on my knees i'm ready to betray You

Ashley Mawere (-Sir Taeps-)