Sarah O'Gorman, Holland

Great women have walked this road before me

  Great women have walked this road before me

  They have left a warm imprint where my foot should

fall

  They have signposted the shortcuts and mapped

out the resting places

  They shaped the geography into something more

convenient

  They have made it superfluous for me to introduce

myself to the winds;

  they have spoken of me to the sun; and booked in

advance

  my audience with the Secret-keeping-sky

  They have danced the beautiful dance into my bones

 Named me their name and called both names out to

the stars

  They have sewn the flowers that I will place in my

hair

  And left me the lyric for all my songs

  They have rained down showers of light when the

place got dark

  Their wisdom opened the hearts that opened doors

to me

            when I sought human-hospitality

  They have told the truth that formed my coat for the

cold

  Great women have walked this road before me

  I will never be lost.

THE RAINFALL AND THE RAINBOW

        So I looked him in the eye

        And I stood real still and never softened

        My stare and said Look good friend,

        I simply refuse to Arrange my life

        The very idea strikes me as being

        Perverse at worst, Pointless

        At best – since it's all

        Outside the Ambitious Stretch of

        our control anyway

        So he put on an undertaker's face

        And touched his jaw with his hand

        And mustered a great hungry sorrow

        To his voice and said

        My, my, my, how crazy you really are

        And I laughed in offence and agreement

        And we walked home alone

        Together,

        One watching the rainbow

        One bowing head to the rainfall

Re-Arrange the World

Let's give love to the hungry

and time off to the greedy

Build a playground for the businessmen

and for every house wife - 

a well educated secretary

I say play music in the library

wouldn't you agree? 

stay silent in the stadium

couldn't you accept? 

Unleash all the fears

de-calanderize all the years

would you believe

could you concieve

Say, "I love you" to a stranger

Say, "I thank you" to a tree

Just sit in the park and write 

rhymes in the sky

Agree on a God and give it your best

Hug her on your right

Kiss him on your left

Cry a little laugh

Shout a little thought

Yeah, re-arrange the world

Instruct the fish to fly

Command the birds to swim

Educate the teachers, 

Paganize the preachers

Show passion to a puritan

a middle finger to a uniform

Go Skyboating and Seaflying

Understand everything living is 

everything dying

But most of all this: 

Learn how to suffer and still to smile. 

Bio:

Sarah O'Gorman is an Irish-Nigerian activist-dreamer. In her writing - of which poetry is only a part - she is seeking soulground and transmutation of the ordinary-everyday into the divine-eternal. Her writing has appeared in The Guardian Newspaper (Nigeria), Greenpepper magazine, Roots, UrbanInk, Kalamu - the pen of Africa as well as on websites such as www.nigeriansinamerica.com and www.baobabconnections.org In 2000 she edited and forwarded Cold Catches Fire a collection of stories, essays and poems against climatic catastrophe. Sarah continues to perform her poetry and music at various events around her adopted city of Amsterdam. There is a struggle for a more beautiful and humane world going on - and whether through poetry, activism or simply in being human - Sarah is committed to that struggle.