A Kismet Path
by Mervyn Seivwright
your birthplace is not forecasted
your chess-piece is not prescribed
nor the social class
nor the family name
nor the fiscal fate
when the womb spawned you
no overview script bestowed
of the village city region country
where scrawling warlords erase the canvas
city slums communes of salvage-home cages
one-traffic-light towns sloughing in degradation
a harvest to manifest
predestinate men unleashing their wrath
the uneasy sounds resonating
a mother’s hum
followed by wall-shakes
buckling metal melting
blazed sun colours after a lightning thunderclap
whisking-wind hiss fiery flush
scattering your mother’s steps
your smells of familiarity sunflower fields
vanishes fleeing whether you are
a child teen adult off the road
your shoes scuffle tearing apart over kilometres
tromping across terrain floating on rubber rafts
repulsed by your “refugee” name
if you escape you promise yourself
to chisel your chess-piece in prized position
planted on a board not burning
*Image by Louie Martinez on Unsplash
About the author
Mervyn Seivwright writes to balance social consciousness & poetry craft for humane growth. He is a nomad from a Jamaican family, born in London-England, and left for America at age 10, now residing in Schopp-Germany. He is a Spalding University MFA grad and has appeared in AGNI, American Journal of Poetry, Salamander Magazine, African American Review, and 61 other journals across 9 countries, receiving recognition as a 2021 Pushcart Nominee & Voices Israel’s Rose Ruben Poetry Competition Honorable-Mention. His collection “Stick, Hook, and a Pile of Yarn,” is available for pre-order through Broken Sleep Books.
Akéwì Magazine 
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