What Came Out as a Poem
The stories that you don’t like are the ones always wanting to become a poem I didn’t choose the lines, I don’t mean to say…
The Hood
The cock-ing of the gun Is the cock crow at the beginning of the day The one who runs helter skelter Is always the stranger…
Premonition
There was this boy I liked we’d sit in his car parked under the night sky, chairs reclined, listening to Fela. He loved to…
Prayers
May the ground hold our footprints, not the bodies of our beloved fragmented by bombs. May a child not lie at a street in Jos…
Postpartum Depression in Men
When you become a father for the first time, The men in your family will call you a strong man As if you pushed the…
Pain Is A Place
My country’s name is Pain. And I beg you not to confuse it for a pseudonym. Pain is its birth name – it’s a name…
Good Mothers Stay Home, Good Fathers Pay
My mother’s hand is a heavy tool, soft when she caresses my hair, Sturdy when she scolds my indolence. She looms yarn from crude cotton…
Entreaty
There are only dried stalks – no green herbs or hibiscus flowers – and echoes of the night owl’s hoots in the garden this harmattan…
Born Again
My mother comes in at the stroke of twelve, Clad in wrapper, blouse, and hair net. With a vial of virgin olive oil underneath her…