To be a poet seems to be a commissioning to write about the collective pains and pleasures of humanity. Ajani Samuel Victor, Nigerian poet, and writer contributes his voice to the anthem of our great poetic commission with this rather brilliant poem, “My Body is a Graveyard.” It was such a pleasure to read his poem.

– Editorial Team

My Body is a Graveyard

Every morning, I write prayer points
on my teeth so I could chew them
like kola nut when I yawn.
The last time breakfast made a
gloss on my lips, the earth was still green.

Watch me open my mouth &
see a brigade of grief jiggling
like a fume of gas in a glass of beer
But my country put a damper on
my voice.

My body is a graveyard
Too much of my nation’s cruelty
buried on the hectares of one flesh
My father was crucified for writing
truth in his name
Our universities are more like an
asylum — lecturers garbs on rags of
students failures.

The sky is always dark here —
a firmament of bodies buried on bodies
of innocent blood tapped in the mouth
of a gun and sometimes bomb
of teenagers, toddlers, and grey hairs
wailing in the coven of bandits.

About The Author

Ajani Samuel Victor is a writer, (performance) poet, author, and political enthusiast who hail from the pacesetter state, Nigeria. At the moment, he is studying Physiology at the University of Lagos. He is a Semi-finalist at the 2020 Jack Grapes Poetry Prize, writer at the Invincible Quill Magazine, Head at Earnest Writes’ Community, his works are/forthcoming on IQM, FeralLit Journal, Ethelzine, AlphaWrites, MadnessMuse Press, Solvicblog, and everywhere else. He is a weird guy who loves everything soccer, lenient as whatever definition you give to that. Cool in all sense. Serendipity is his definition of sanity.

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