Happy to announce that I have officially published my first book titled HIS WORDS. HIS EMPIRE. HIS REIGN – now available on Amazon. Few words can truly describe the feeling – of being so raw and honest and vulnerable on paper – but that’s always been the beauty of poetry – it speaks for you and through you. Years of writing summarized in a few pages. Emotional roller-coasters and flowery sentences. Personification of the human soul and experience.
All on paper.
Get yourself a copy 🙂
I.
I am sorry about your abuse. I am sorry that your uncles forced themselves into you. I am sorry you were too young to fight – too naive to recognize your captivity. I am sorry the bedroom walls turned to prison bars. I am sorry they took their turn on you. I am sorry your screams couldn’t shake the trauma — ricocheting back to your ears in surrender. Where was God then? Or Jesus? I am sorry you lost your faith before you even found it.
Your father chose not to believe you. Your father read the newspaper. As you knelt on the floor begging to be heard. Your father flipped the pages. As you spoke of his brothers. As you suffocated to the memories. Your loss of innocence. Your father jaded your soul. With his disbelief. Killing you softly. With his ignorance. Killing you softly. With his silence. Your father chose not to see the scars. Or the blood. Or the torn apart clothes. Or the arch in your back. Or the pain in your large, beautiful Yoruba eyes. Your father called you a “little whore” for lying. For speaking evil on his brothers. Your father. Your father taught you to apologize.
For being raped.
II.
You found out, years later, that your father sold you. He said your body was never yours to begin with. He died without apologizing. He died, and you found the strength to attend his funeral. You refused to give the eulogy. You let the silence sit with his soul.
May his soul burn in eternal hell.
III.
Your lover kisses your forehead. Your lover recites your name like a sensual poem. Akanni – your legs tremble. Akanni – your loins are filled with fire. Your lover kisses your lips. He knows your rhythm. Slow, yet intense. Your lover is a master at loving you. And you love that about him. He parts your legs. Gentle, yet firm. He caresses your thighs with his hands. Your chest arches. Consumed by desire. Consumed by fantasies about to be fulfilled. Yet. Yet you stop him. Before it goes too far. Before the pinnacle of lust. You tell him of your past. Of your uncles. Of your father. He knows. This not the first you have told him this. He knows. And he is tired. Of rejection. Of waiting. Of not being a father.
Your lover begins to rage. Fire rolls off his tongue. Like Satan’s wrath. You place your hand on his chest. You try to consul him. And gloriously fail. He… he calls you an “old whore”. A woman your age should be grateful to find someone – he says. He calls your body a graveyard. Of love. And hopes. And dreams. The bedroom walls turn to prison bars. Your lover escapes. And you remain captive – to a past you could not control.
The face of my forefathers.
men that smoked polygamy once.
and forgot to exhale.
men that –
stirred women.
– like fine wine.
between their tongues.
bitter sweet.
misogyny.
angry black.
women that –
breastfed.
– with both hands.
as if forcing a prayer.
into their children’s existence.
as if our lips.
– knew God.
as if we could empty
– the pain.
of father’s mistakes.
of men like.
– arsonists.
with petroleum for fingers.
women touched –
– between their thighs.
igniting sparks.
– sweaty nights.
deadly fights.
kisses from.
– other women.
– emotional tides.
– sons like.
– fire extinguishers.
– putting out.
– mothers burning.
– from your.
– fuckery.
Wear my poetry.
On your skin.
Recite parts of me.
On your stretch marks.
Carry my sensuality.
On your tongue.
Speak.
Only about us.
Of my Ubuntu lips.
Sun kissing.
Hot.
Seductive breathing.
Breathe in.
Our moments.
In every line.
Surprise me …
Tell your father you aren’t his.
Anymore.
Pack your belongings.
Recite me.
In every crevice.
Unwrap time.
As you fold.
Bags.
Heavy.
Like my body.
Unpacking sweat.
On yours.
Drown in me.
In every rhyme.
Wait for me.
On Beale Street.
Trace your ears.
One last time.
Whispers.
From me.
Sweeter.
Than honeymoons.
Tell your mother.
I am coming.
To take you home.
Reading challenge – I
To whatever gods inspired this list, I am forever indebted.
Progress:
– Currently reading ‘The Thing Around Your Neck’ – Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.
I come in many shapes and sizes.
To some, I am a man of charisma; the kind that stifles fear and electrifies the will.
To others, I am the biggest loser; the man with a balding sense of humour.
To the art of words, I am her brave Mister; the fool that tried to tame her and failed.
I do not claim that Poetry loves me in the same manner, but tis the love Shakespeare proclaimed.
A love affair with the sublime that only ends in one way: when the writer stops writing.
I was three when I first met my muse — my Juliette of poetry?
Sparks flew when she spoke in metaphors and I in broken vows and sentences.
I made a mockery of myself; what with the diaper and the lack of sophistication?
So I strengthened my acquisition with the world; I learnt the language of Men and Bots.
I went to pre-school.
I learnt to colour in between the lines to impress her. I was fervently in love with my muse, but I could not express her. I fell sick; my muse ignored me still.
From an early age to adolescent, I buried myself in television. I let the ambient box sing me to sleep. I let it erase my talents. I dragged through life and death — then back through life. I did things I would never trade my breath for — like learning to dance with both feet. The magic was missing. There was no thrill, no spunk.
Till I read ‘My Black Is Beautiful’ by Yolanda Mabuto.
If admitting that I cried means I’ll be stripped of my right to be a man, then set me free. I was revitalised of an energy I once knew; I was alive again. And I felt my muse blink.
Ever collapse to the sensation of being home after a long trip?
I felt the same; I felt the rush of belonging to something bigger than self — of belonging to Juliette.
I read more and she spoke a little louder. We dined over Jane Austen’s passages, laughed like children in Chuck Lorre’s ‘Vanity Cards’ and survived horrors in Stephen King’s ‘Nightmares and Dreamscapes’.
The more I marched over the terrains of literature, the closer I came to my muse.
Soon, we became one; we became night and day.
And with a kiss, she vanished.
She said I was ready.
Ready for what?
Ready to write.
Read the first of the series here.
She walks through,
Roads filled with street signs and scars,
Of graffiti and tattoos on walls,
Sex symbols and misery in red,
RRUUN,
She knows not to stay,
She knows not to become one with the darkness of the night,
She knows not,
Of prostitutes and pimps that turn their hustle into songs,
And force strangers to sing,
9 p.m,
The streetlights flicker,
10,
The silence falls,
Schizophrenic,
Yet the voices go,
The clicks of heels hitting the ground,
Sing me to sleep,
Baby,
1036,
She paces,
Not slick on the gas pedal,
He notices,
Through the rear view mirror,
Through the iris of a sinner,
Through instinct,
He reverses,
Slick on the gas pedal,
She falls,
Legs confused by the pulse of fear,
Legs confused by the head games of her stilettos,
1035,
He steps out of the car,
1036,
His steps are quiet,
1037,
The stillness of lust masquerading as innocence,
1037,
Heavy,
The weight of his presence on her skin,
1037,
Heavy,
She feels undressed by the ghosts of his hands,
Heavy,
She feels herself shaping into the arc of his desire,
And breaking,
Sing me to sleep,
Baby,
Chills of the devil’s voice,
You are one of them now,
You are one of the girls.
Sometimes we forget. That those closest to us are capable of the most heinous acts.
I.
The hum of her skirt,
Stories of lust sewn in,
He sings along,
Thoughts of skin on skin,
And echoes of her plea,
Melodious,
The subjugation of her will,
Melodious,
The screams of her inching to survive,
Yet moaning to the thrust,
Of him,
She denies the face of the man that robs her,
She denies,
Yet moans?
She denies,
The face of her father,
She gives in,
Because she feels,
That’s the only way,
Out.
Colonialism kissed,
The face of the African sun,
Systematic,
The infiltration of the devil’s kiss,
Illusions of colour,
Illusions that blinded,
The hearts of supremacists,
WE ARE CHILDREN,
Dreams of our ancestors,
Silhouettes of their realities,
Our minds cannot conceive of,
Shades of black,
of niggers cut,
blood,
Bath of kaffirs,
The knife that is white privilege,
WE WERE BORN,
With a melanin scarred,
We spite,
The stretch marks on our skin,
Yet poverty sits,
On the roof of our tongues,
Can we afford to speak?
Lineages of men,
That smoked polygamy once,
And forgot to exhale,
Lineages of men,
That skip responsibility with a tempo,
Crescendos of pain,
Crescendos of absence,
Men that leave,
Before daughters utter the word,
Father.
A MOTHER’S VICE,
Chinua demands,
Chinua demands to eat,
Chinua always demands,
His stomach shouts,
Ghosts of his vigor,
Ghosts of his hard work,
His stomach shouts,
Substances of liquor,
Substances of his hard work?
She kneels,
And washes the hand that bruised and battered her,
She kneels,
And feeds the mouth that swallows her name whole,
Before vomiting out another,
Priscilla?
The turn of her insides.
She knows not,
Of the silent messages,
And the loudness of moans,
That aren’t hers,
She knows not,
Of the legs that spread,
On the same bed that holds her secrets,
She knows not,
Of her daughter’s beauty,
Because hers, surely,
Isn’t enough,
She knows not?
She knows,
And justifies,
And kneels.
You taste like poetry.
You taste like parts of you are falling apart, yet pulling themselves together.
You taste like contradictions.
You are contradictions.
