Ekoja’s body was a haunted house.
Haunted: by a glowing darkness;
by a cocktail of voices fading into silence;
by footsteps echoing a numbing pain.
[You’ll never know that scars are ghosts
until your deepest wounds die but you
still hear their voices in your head]
Like a perforated song, he tried in vain
to hold rhythm, he was a void of brokenness,
a hollowed silence, an opaque aquarium of tears
an equation, I later learned could not be solved
without making ‘pain’ the subject of the formula
On the night of his passing, he said,
“I am not just a survivor,
I am the leftovers of a meal eaten by
the war which began in my brother’s groin
& ended on my wife’s body, where I caught him
painting a 3-D image of lust & betrayal”
“Every day comes replaying the dimensions of that war:
The rise & fall of sweaty bodies, dripping pleasure,
The soft silky moans, paving a path to orgasm
on the matrimonial bed of a man you call ‘brother‘ “
“That day, I died for the first time,
my illusionary fatherhood, like an abobaku,
followed me to my grave
to explain why the lad I called ‘son’
could pronounce all words, but ‘father’ “
abobaku: Yoruba word for the royal servant who is buried with the king at his death.
This poem made third place in the Nigerian Students Poetry Prize. It has been published by the Poets in NigeriaInitiative in an anthology titled MICAH.
Photo credit: pexels.com

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2 days ago
Writing Contests to Enter in March 2021 - Eboquills Literary Blog
eboquills.com
Here are some writing contests and prizes you can enter for this March. These prizes are FREE to enter so all you have to do is just write.Here are some #writingcontests and prizes you can enter your work this month. These prizes are FREE to enter, so all you have to do is just #write:
https://eboquills.com/2021/03/04/writing-contests-to-enter-in-march-2021/
Best wishes!
#WritingCommunity #Writer #writerslife #writing #submissions #creativewriting #eboquills
Our #MCM for the week is Saddiq Dzukogi @SaddiqDzukogi. His collection of poems, “Your Crib, My Qibla”, has earned rave reviews since its recent publication.
Award-winning poet, Ilya Kaminsky, describes it as a “stunning, memorable book”!
@UnivNebPress
"...
You had your voice,
yet silence was your outburst ..."
In this #poem, Ojo Emmanuel writes about loss, grief, and the long painful journey to healing. It is a sad, sensational poem & worth the #read.
https://eboquills.com/2021/02/27/one-poem-by-nigerian-poet-ojo-emmanuel/
#poetrycommunity #poets #WritingCommunity
Wow!
This is wonderful.
Do you have the other two poems that made the first and second position?
Thank you.
I don’t have those, but you could get it by visiting the Poets in Nigeria website.
“…to explain why the lad I called ‘son’ could pronounce all words, but ‘father’. “
Those words!
I bet they had the same effect on me when I first put them down.
Thanks for reading me.
You’re wonderful.
Very good web site you have got here.