Time of the Legend with Zimbabwean Poet Patience Chiyangwa.

Patience Chiyangwa, I got stewed in your sizzling pot hot with nerve -jamming imagery and psyche-wrecking metaphor . Real poetry smacks your dozing mind and then you are hastily re-awakened to see images that seemed invisible of late . You are miraculously transfigured into Paul like the biblical Saul on the way to Damascus. It is when each verse beat drums inside your heart- caves . The reality of real poetry sits steadily onto readers belly , the pangs and the pain are ingredients of the consciousness abound . Real poetry bulldozes through uncollected rubbish dumps on the bottoms of cities and exposes the wretchedness within . It dives its way through cholera infested drinking water holes and beat with the frail hearts of dying communities . It smacks heavily on the corruption hardened faces of unrepentant charlatans and double- chinned zealots. Patience Chiyangwa brings a new dose of literary consciousness. Her poetry taste both maturity and prowess. Chiyangwa is an advocate of the hungry , the poor , the raped , the orphaned and the rejected. She is one of the prolific pioneers of Zimbabwean spoken word and page poetry. We are proud to publish creativity , diversity and dexterity in the person of Legendary Patience Chiyangwa-( Blurb by Mbizo CHIRASHA)

Wretched hearts

Now that the sun has dived deep into its enthralling horizon

Symphonic birdsong denotes that wrecked city of affection

It could have been on a beckoning blustery pouring night

Our feet staggered to the tune of the disgruntled rancorous wind

Yet we cuddled away in that wintery freezing livid breeze

Our breathe captured unapologetically in the break of spring

Perhaps we were slaves of the embrace of the soothing African sun

The instance of our parting lives with us forever

It was that barking dog that was music to our souls

Or was it the laughing hyena that was heralding the inevitable

It could have been the day the princess lost her virginity

But how I am convinced the curse was from the venom spitting anaconda

I was immersed in the cat’s melodious mews on the porch

It should have resonated with the invasive piercing baby screams

Perhaps the blinkers were our very own narcissism

That garden of roses and daisies blooms so enchanting

With the infesting weeds we took for granted

Much as the shedding off leaves in the winter’s cold

These seasons should never be snubbed

Only finding ourselves drifting in our ignorance

I was surfing in the corridors of romantic fantasy

Perhaps I was drowned in the imaginary mastery of his prowess

In the solitude of the silence of the loud proclamations

Oblivion to the imminent setting sun of passions

It could have been the songs of the tune of our broken guitar

Fading in the never impending the break of dawn

Motioning our staggering steps to grasping our foothold at dusk

Now that the sun has dived deep into the enthralling horizon

How our guilty feet have lost the rhythm

Perhaps these feet surrender to never dance that way again.

Careless serenade

So my sassiness is making you puke?

We are tangerines and not oranges to your taste buds

Waal, you got us whipping lemonade with your lemons

Oh you wannabe destiny of our unparalleled pursuit of purpose

So we kind of hate to see you like this

With your fellow fat cats and mediocrity loyalists

Who are the ones you so ought to count on

Oh how you will never get us dancing to your phony tunes

I have never seen a beggar feast on their own vomit

You are pigging on our very filthy, leper poverty

We are a battalion of unicorns, pagans, clowns and whores

Oh how our revolution is a systemic symphony of your demise

I see it in the intensity of my fiery and feisty menstrual blood

Feel it in the gnawing jaws of venomous menstruation sting

We are a defiant uprising claiming the sanity of the human race

Oh how the election will not be stolen and the ballot box will secure its birthright

So this will be some talk of the past too Zimbabwe

What happens in the dark will always come to light

We are fertility, they buried us and too naïve to grasp we were seeds

Oh how no one ever take away the creator given right to conceive.

Zimbo Lullaby

Oh hush my child, Tula, Tula, Wena!!

Could this be the very sign?

Of the sting of my boiling sweat?

This scourging heat raging really deep,

Into the bowels of my maternal instincts

Intimidation to my fundamental survival.

In this desolating volatile economy

mandatory confinement to my homestead,

is breeding clouds of looming starvation.

Am pondering on our smothering incomes,

when we are confined and shrinking

in the reality of this pandemic

Beyond the countryside and far afield

He is fighting for the survival of the clan

He did not make it home this Christmas

Scavenging much to his own starvation

The cars are said to be thirsty too in the city,

I am told it has angered the cost of our food

This scourging heat rages deep,

into the bowels of my maternal instincts,

poisoning the guts of my cultivated land

beyond my attempt to fend for this clan

He gave me a bag full of bank notes

which I have just been told cannot even buy a seed

Oh hush my child! Sleep. Sleep

While I ponder the way out this shithole

Wrestling this heat fatigue, as I watch and hassle

about my challenged once productive plough.

He is hustling and chasing the wind in the city,

against the odds of the new pandemic normal

A statistical reminder of a world that does not care,

That feeds on its poor and susceptible

Your road has been a rough and winding road to the city

Much as my grind in the dry and barren fields

This is the story of our long walk to freedom.

Patience Chiyangwa(PhD) ,A passionate mother of two girls and a women’s and child rights charity worker activist holding a Doctor of Humanities Honoris Causa, Commonwealth University, Master & BA in Communications, Atlantic International University USA, Diplomas in Journalism, INTEC College, South Africa and in Public Relations, Zimbabwe Institute of Public Relations and undergraduate Bachelor of Law , University of South Africa. I obtained a Master Class, Certificate in Business Management & Leadership from the London Graduate School and Right to Development, Disability Rights in the African Context & African Human Rights System in Comparative Perspective Courses from the Advanced Centre for Human Rights, University of Pretoria, South Africa, and Faculty of Law. I am the Executive Director of Foundation Zimbabwe, founder of Keepers Alert and TheWorld’BigSleepOutHarare. I worked for Childline Zimbabwe for over a decade in Public Relations, Advocacy and Resource Mobilization. I was the Founder/Editor of its first in-house magazine, The Connexion. I published Childline Zimbabwe advertorial articles in the Herald and the Independent newspapers and articles in the POTRAZ POST and the government ICT ministry magazines amongst others. I held guest lecturer sessions at the College of Southern Africa Journalism & Mass Communication classes on Child Friendly Reporting. I am the recipient of the 2012 Ulrich Wickert International Journalist Child Rights International Award Winner hosted by Plan Germany in Berlin Germany. I attended the inaugural commemorations of the International Day of the Girl Child on 11^th October 2012 at the Potsdam Plaza, Berlin Germany. I am an accredited Journalist with the Media Commission of Zimbabwe, Member of the Zimbabwe. I attended the 1^st African Girl’s Summit on Ending Child Marriage in Africa 26 – 27Nov 2015 Lusaka, Zambia. I am the EatOut Movement Force4Good Awards 29^th March 2019 Winner, Outstanding in the category of Women & Children in efforts in fighting against homelessness. I am an Amazon Author published in August 2019, A Diary of Patience. I am one of the initial members of the Zimbabwe Women Writers published in the 1992 Bury Thy Humble Poetry Collection by Rosemary Smith-Kebe, in the (ZWW) 1993 English   Anthology edited by Norma Kitson, in the Prose & Poetry by Zimbabwe Women Writers July 1998 Anthology, in the 2015 Traps English Poetry Collection edited by Ethel Kabwato and Zimbabwe Women Writers, Harare Branch 1998 Vice-Chairperson. I was published in the Young Women First 2^nd Edition short story contributor (SAFAIDS Regional publication). I was a participant in the documentary of ‘Sex in the City in Harare” by the International Video Fair 2009. I was a Board Member of Child Resource Institute Zimbabwe, of the International Child Resource Institute, USA and was a member of the School Development Committee, Borrowdale School 2015

Mbizo CHIRASHA( Time of the Poet Republic Curator)   Author of a Letter to the President. co-Authored Whispering Woes of Ganges and Zambezi. Co-Edited Street Voices Poetry Collection (Germany Africa Poetry Anthology). Co- Editor of the Corpses of Unity Anthology.  Associate Editor at  Diasporia(n) online. Chief Editor at Time of the Poet Republic. Founding Editor at WomaWords Literary Press. Publisher at Brave Voices Poetry journal.  Curator at Africa Writers Caravan. UNESCO-RILA Affiliate Artist at University of Glasgow. 2020 Poet in Residence Fictional Café. 2019 African Fellow, IHRAF.ORG. Project Curator and Co-Editor of the Second Name of Earth is Peace (Poetry Voices Against WAR Anthology). Contributing Essayist to Monk Arts and Soul Magazine.  Poetry and writtings appear in  FemAsia Magazine ,Wrath -Bearing Tree, Inksweat andtears journal , One Ghana One Magazine, Ofi Press, World Poetry Almanac, Demer Press , Atunis Galaxy poetry online , IHRAF Publishes , The Poet a Day , Bezine.Com , Sentinel UK, Oxford School of Poetry Pamphlet , Africa Crayons, PulpitMagazine,Poetry Pacific, Zimbolicious , Best New Poets ,Poetry Bulawayo , Gramnet webjournal, Diogen Plus , Poeisis.si , Festival de Poesia Medellin and elsewhere .

TIME OF THE POET-An Internet based Writers Center, Archiving Theme based Digital Poetry Anthologies and publishing Iconic Poets ,Writers and Artists from around the globe. TIME OF POET REPUBLIC was founded by UNESCO-RILA Affliate ARTIST. Freedom of SPEECH Fellow PEN-Zentrum Deutschland.2019 African FELLOW ihraf.org and Acclaimed Literary Arts Diplomatie,Mbizo CHIRASHA.