Ego Trippin the poem by Nikki GIovanni


Ego Trippin’

 

Nikki Giovanni

 

I was born in the Congo

 

I walked to the fertile crescent and built the Sphinx

 

I designed a pyramid so tough that a star

 

that glows every one hundred years falls into

 

the center giving divine perfect light

 

I AM BAD

 

 

 

I sat on the throne

 

drinking nectar with Allah

 

I got hot and sent an ice age to Europe

 

to cool my thirst.

 

My oldest daughter is Nefferttiti

 

the tears from my birth pains created the Nile

 

I am a beautiful woman

 

 

 

I gazed on a forest and burned out the

 

Sahara Desert

 

With a packet of goat’s meat

 

and a change of clothes -

 

I crossed it in two hours

 

I am a gazelle so swift -

 

so swift - you can’t catch me

 

 

 

For a birthday present when he was three

 

I gave my son Hannibal an elephant -

 

He gave me Rome for Mother’s Day

 

My strength flows ever on

 

 

 

My son Noah built new/ark and

 

I stood proudly at the helm

 

as we sailed on a soft summer day

 

I turned myself into myself -

 

and was Jesus!

 

men intone my loving name

 

 

 

All praises - All praises

 

I am the one who would save

 

 

 

I sowed diamonds in my backyard

 

My bowels deliver uranium

 

the filings from my fingernails

 

are semi-precious jewels

 

On a trip north I caught a cold and blew my nose

 

giving oil to the Arab world

 

I am so hip - even my errors are correct

 

I sailed east to reach west - and had to round off the

 

earth as I went

 

The hair from my head thinned and gold was laid

 

across three continents

 

 

 

I am so perfect, so divine, so ethereal, so surreal

 

I cannot be comprehended

 

except by my permission

 

 

 

I mean ... I ... can fly

 

like a bird in the sky ...