Dayò Ayílárá is a lawyer, business consultant, cartoonist, graphics designer, and calligrapher. He writes from Abuja, Nigeria. His poetry focuses on nature, the beauty in pain, hope, love, and loss.

Old Garment

I have to be full of play

put my old garment away

let it pass, this dull life

i have lost everything

my music, guitar, and string

what more is there to strife?

laughter dissolves its bricks

my roof is at ankle level

no one is asking what is this rumble

is it his heart that sinks

that lively, happy boy?

no, it is my joy

yam dissolves into flour

beans dissolve into cake

the grumbling of nagging men

made the moon melancholic

it is enmity that dissolves a song

into parables.

Palette

Cobwebs paint memories of death to the flea

the artist is a womanizer of colours

when a star drops dead a soul is set free

from paintings and from memories,

your sketchpad withdrawn eternally

only those who can place their eyes

in their fingers can grip the lead

and i can remember how many sheets were torn

how many pencils broken – from the heart

some artworks were fine but they had not learnt to paint

their desires from a sketchy dream

we think of living as imaginative composition

but what does life think of us

still life or still birth

either you draw or you drag

you get at something

may i not sleep to wake at my life’s end

may all fine colours of this palette of life be mine

in art class at FUSC, some drew what they saw

others saw what they drew

today

hunger paints wealth

and wealth draws arrogance well

somehow

somewhere

someone in sketching something.

FUSC: Foundation Upper Standard College, Ajangbadi, Lagos

Contributor’s Bio

Dayò Ayílárá is a lawyer, business consultant, cartoonist, graphics designer, and calligrapher. He writes from Abuja, Nigeria. His poetry focuses on nature, the beauty in pain, hope, love, and loss. Dayò Ayílárá is his name and not a pseudonym.

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