Body of Water

Isaiah Adepoju, Nigeria

Yellow suns. Flamingo roofs. something drops again—
no, not a person, the churchyards are filled again.
a TV shows a boy holding a photograph—nobody collects it
from him, sometimes, he bites the tip of the photograph to be sure the person
in it was alive. something drops off, a photograph, and lands on the stream-current.
ghosts come here too, every fortnight, demanding ransom, asking to be
buried in a feral home—I ask: how come home is not peace and vice versa?
how come we change into poems for our grave to know we didn’t die
in our sleep, that we drowned in ephemeral sins—things so fleeting
we quickly forget our bodies, sweaty; our moans striding nostril passages—and
then the church holding our burials while we run.
home is where my war is. I go on a long walk, scrawny hair on my head, a photograph
nobody sees in my hand, a prayer I and the photograph hears. I bite the edge to nudge the dead awake. are you sleeping again?
& as a child, my body falls into the river keel, my feet feeling for soil,
my arms wrapped in the letting go, I see Isaiah down below, just beneath the coral
he has found our heaven and when I lean into him,
he says: come, Jonah, I’ve found a home, just beyond the marshes,
just beyond there when our faces cringe into a body of water…

Isaiah Gbenga, 18, writing from Osun State Nigeria, is a vibrant writer and author of ALAGEMO (Pengician Chapbook Winner 2020).