The Poetry Marathon

The Traces on my Palm (literary projects prompts hour 3)

 

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trapped in my fingerprints, the traces are

not left on lines, rather, the smell of salt

buried in palms leaves a footprint of memories–

–and hope.

the air of whimpers serenades my life;

weight of memories in my head massages my

crossed leg. Modupe once asked if I could cross the roads in

Lagos without being led. maybe I should have told him

that the traces of lines on my palm lead me home.

my mother used to ask me why I took pride in tattooing my body with ink. I guess

my body is a piece of paper. was it?

sometimes, the levitical in my brother’s lyrics

unwraps balls of wasted passions and time

meant to be thrown back in time as childhood pasts.

and everytime I try to sleep, the moon won’t shine-

there are a lot of secrets in the dark of my sleep- so I wouldn’t see the paths.

so I leave a circle in my thumb to warn me to never

leave the boundaries as if “inyankanyan” means death. but still

I’m tensed; my stiff back won’t rest on the hard chair of comfort.

for now,

my fingerprints spreads over the missing disc.

THE CLIMB

Dark, tiny, confined,
Barely able to reach out in front of me.
I look up to see a pinpoint of light and have hope.
Looking for a way out, I push forward.
Wall.
I run my fingers along the floor and feel a rock.
I place my foot on it as the air starts to thicken.
I clench onto a jagged stone and pull myself up, praying it does not give way.
I breathe a sigh of relief for it is strong, and I take one more step up.
I feel around again, this time finding a crevice.
I hold my breath as I place my hand inside.
Exhaling, I take another step up, relieved the crevice was not otherwise occupied.
The weight of my body becoming heavier over the next few maneuvers,
I start to feel weak.
I want to give up,
Let go and fall back to the bottom.
I take another breath.
WAIT!
It’s different…
The air isn’t as thick.
I close my eyes for a moment, and when I open them –
I can start to make out the bricks on the wall…
My strength comes back, and I begin climbing faster.
Every so often, my foot slips.
I stop, discouraged and afraid.
I look up and see the pinpoint light has now become the size of a basketball.
I close my eyes and take a deep breath.
Slow down!
It’s not a race, I remind myself.
I open my eyes and continue on.
The darkness is fading away, and I can breathe easier.
Are those voices I hear?
Are they calling my name?
No.
Just silence.
Feeling alone again,
I want to give up.
I start to cry, ready to let go.
What’s the point?
There’s no end to this.
But then…
The light becomes blinding,
The air, pure.
Suddenly, I feel hands grabbing, pulling.
Frightened, I scream and start to fight back.
My eyes adjust to the new light, and I stop fighting.
I am wrapped safely in the arms of my family and friends,
My loved ones who helped save me from the darkness.

Hour #3: “Vascular Jewelry”

My heart is a mudpie bleeding in the rain
So bright of red that it contains the sun.
Sopping clay falling through tiny fingers,
to the soft applause of relentless rain.
Cold petrichor fossils burn through icy nostrils,
choking back chalky mouthfuls of earthen fruit.
A child cries. Rivers of mud pour from her chin,
Death ebbs, all bloodied across her hands.

Until the tears burn like electric darts,
lightning of the mind, short-circuited, leaking,
Where Endymion eternally reaches for a fleeting moon
sinking behind the mountains of Caria.
My heart is a pale rock fading in the night.

The sky, a remorseless sea that seeks
to drown all light with its magnitude.
Where blue devils tear the sash from around my chest.
The harder they claw, the more death is like a dream,
a kaleidoscopic interplay of ontological absurdity
on the green table of mortality
where umbrellas float upside down
like orbiting fishing boats without rudders
until I drink the ocean dry,
and spit it back out,
filtered through my teeth.

The mad wolf turns his eyes towards the moon,
hungry and full of salt. The last bits of light
slip over the horizon forever.
Sweet, jellied darkness
I carried you in the womb of my nightmares!
“Aller Anfang ist schwer.”
All beginnings are hard,
until the stone smiles
and grows eyes so that it may sleep.
It’s draining arteries, a delicate latticework
of diluted oil drowning in the stream.

In commemoration of the lost people

In commemoration of the lost people.

There’s no loss unless there’s something worth

Searching for, worth giving a found-it tag.

In a black bus in sarkin pawa,

A woman aches in righteous anger

For all the people the bandits’ bullet

Was fortunate enough to retract from earths fine skin.

I know her ache because I,

Too, have nested my ruin in communal faith.

She didn’t want to bend towards the ruin

to become a body of light,

she didn’t want to be

Refracted into a bent rainbow &

tap colors from all the music our

home has gradually learned to fade into

But the heart carries its ache more than the

body sags to its own burden.

she starts a gbagyi praise song and lost her

voice into the part where the musician said  “god if i fall,

lift me, and may they not laugh at my fall”

and to say this with eleven episodes of hope,

she breaks her accent into an accident of several casualties:

my body is the most injured.

The aching silence shoots through her mouth

 and she  sings her voice into pebbles.

It’s in her sprawling and sparkling body that

I see our communal birthmark: black

Smoke-stain traced perfectly into a broken country.

 I speak to her with my Gods tongue: no fatigue,

nor disease, nor sorrow, nor sadness,

Nor hurt, nor distress befalls a woman.

She put her hands into mine and I can texture

 the coarseness of her pa(lm)in,

I carry all the burden she has come this far to annihilate &

today I’m unable to bend/fold into a prayer,

so I attempt my  gods accent  again and verily and

verily it’s in the remembrance of  lost people

Do hearts find rest.

Endless Possibilities

The airplane landed in New York with 500 passengers, all named Bill.

They each took one step on the tarmac.

One of them yelled What’s all this?

On the runway inside the puddles were tiny bugs flashing tiny bug lights.

Each Bill chose a bug and followed it toward the sunrise.

Unreal (hour 3)

My thoughts are the inside of a lava lamp, cluttered and combining into a beautiful heated mess.

I have a loaded gun, but no trigger

I hear blood fill my ears. Danger has never tasted so good. I touch the lifeless body that is no longer mine. I see nothing but fear, and I taste the air to try and bring me back.

I see mattie on the train where a stranger should be

I am the trigger

Roses are red, violets are blue

Roses are red, violet is blue
I want to dance, get lost
in imagination life has come
with different shades of struggles

find love, find life
I cry, my brothers are busy being
second class citizens in another man’s land

they can’t love,
No, they can’t be loved, their skin
colour is always a subject matter,
I am a subject matter
our woes have grown taller than we are.

I am here, playing dead log,
finding sympathy
I think I’m so overwhelmed, if only
I could reverse to all the good old days

we lived
with everyone around cheerful, beautiful
we were once happy, I wish
no one ever leaved.

© Àdèlé

DESTINY

HOUR 3

DESTINY

As a child, I played with dolls,

An unconscious yearning,

a training.

When I grew older

I looked after my younger siblings,

honing my protective skills,

and waiting.

I loved my freedom,

my individuality,

my body.

Yet I was ready to surrender

all three,

to the children I wanted.

I surrendered.

I was fulfilled.

I loved my role,

to feed, protect and

nourish.

Today, they are grown.

I still feed them,

protect them,

and nourish them

With my love.

Hour 3–Target Practice

The Archer Aims

at moving targets

Myopic in the haze of

smoked bliss

Grasps poisoned

Arrows

the Black Dog Howling with Hunger;

Gollum with his

Golden Ring of Ale

Aimed but missed

falls into the abyss

 

 

 

 

Pleasure in the mundane

As a creature
Of habit I
Don’t like detours

I take pleasure
In the mundane
Routine of life

During my youth
I woke with
Eagerness for school

Did my chores
Ate my breakfast
Caught my bus

Went through the
Day with enthusiasm
Relished each class

The last bell
Sent me to
Work at A&W

My day ended
With the evening
Meal and homework

I listened to
My sister expound
On her crushes

Before I could
Close my eyes
And find slumber