A’ La Maison Une Fois de Plus Avant de Mourir

A’ La Maison Une Fois de Plus Avant de Mourir

[Home Once More Before I Die]

By : Karlton A. Armistad

Date : 20/09/21

1.

Clear blue seas and warm white sand

Hands go through it, feeling a deep connection to my island home

Giving up everything I know and love did not an easy decision make

25 Years away and so many tears, tragedies, loneliness & heartbreak

Jealousy and ignorance tore me from my mother’s arms

She knew if she did not, they would murder me in cold blood

My body dragged through the streets beaten and battered from torture

No mother could watch & cheer as they dismembered her child without fear.

2.

Run and make no mistake

If I had failed to flee there would be no more Me

My life free game for them to take

One last time I watched the sunrise over a misty Jamaican sky

The hummingbird sang, as the cockerel’s crow rang out to say goodbye

I boarded the iron bird that flew Me to safety

To the new place and fast pace that had opportunity a-plenty

Her Majesty’s land with its London Bridge & guards would keep me safe

3.

Stranger days came, with darker obstacles and even darker hearts

Aimed at changing the boy into a man if they can, or rip him clean apart

From the four steel bars inside a prison cell

He learnt men can’t be trusted as He lived his living hell

Shut everyone out and talk to the silence

Pain a soothing comfort in all the bitter violence

Traitors wore the face of friends

Supplication & education surround the boy till the nightmare ends

Mother crying and sick with worry

I have time to tell her everything there is no hurry

No idea that the clock had started ticking with time not on his side

Before He could blink, in a breath and a wink, Cancer took her and she died

4.

Never to see her alive again destroyed the very soul of the boy she raised

Journey home he must, to lay her to rest, as she passed with her eyes waiting

To gaze upon her ‘belly pain’ one last time

Waiting to hold him to her bosom, stroke his silken dark hair

So soothing so comforting is the warmth of a mother’s care

The wound in him cannot be healed until he is allowed to board the iron bird

Back to his people and his roots, to close a catastrophic chapter

Mother loses Son, and the sun goes down on both their happily ever-after.

5.

Clouds filled with beautiful blue hopes and dreams

Adorn the skies and guides the iron bird back to the island’s shores

With precious cargo of that scared and frightened child

No longer a boy but a man with plan, and his eyes opened wide

Even though it be a very dangerous journey, he knew journey he must

Nostrils filled with the sweet smell of the red poinsettia, in her spirit he trusts

Every step carefully planned, there can be no celebration as slip in and out is what must take place.

If they knew he was back, they certainly would attack

All that sacrifice and pain would be in vain.

6.

Dirty dusty 4x4 vehicle barely keeps grip to the country’s mountainous roads

Lush greenery on either side and people leading happy lives doing just as they are told.

Entering his mother’s village, his heart speeds up with a bursting joy

In his wildest dreams and all that he’d seen, he never thought he would be here again.

Relatives pull at him and hug him and tears flow openly

Prodigal son, to land had come to seek peace by his Mother’s graveside

Weeping eyes and broken heart, with him as he sits with her

The burden that almost broke him, will no longer yolk him

He would leave it there with her

To those that say freedom costs nothing, a blatant and utter lie

As this Son and mother paid the ultimate price to make sure the Son didn’t die

7.

25 years was the last time they saw each other alive

25 years of regret with the story not over yet

One of them left behind

To tell this tale of a mother’s love

Now She watches over the Boy from up above.

(End)