GHOST SEED
At your funeral, your face stopped
aging. My memory knelt
before your open coffin & counted
six possible wrinkle marks
the embalming process contoured
out of your narrow face.
The structure of the room
where you were laid, folded the tears
of loved & unloved relatives
into the imperfect frame
of your left ankle, swallowed by lymphedema.
The Priest asked five relatives to walk
around your coffin,
singing your favorite hymn. We chorused
out of the huge hymnal
we held.
There is a part of you hiding
in my memory. Your shadow
decomposed as your body melted
& disfigured
the shape of my face
in mourning.
In the morning
after your funeral, looking
into the mirror, I saw wrinkle marks
on my face, unwrapping
your crippled love fantasies—unlived
girlhood glimmers gushed from my eyes like blood
from a pricked varicose vein.
My body is now an asylum
for your memory.
Manifest yourself.
*
THE WORLD IS NOT STOPPING
Lately, I’ve been angry
with the world—
it’s my new coping mechanism.
Somewhere in my country,
an oversized
penis is being chiseled
into the vagina
of a six-year-old. I want it
to break
in there. To be burned
like a bandit
meted by jungle justice
as his final fate.
But she is just a girl
& shouldn’t witness another
sight that is triggering,
alarming, sending her body
into absolute stillness.
The world
is spinning fast—
pretending like the little girl
doesn’t exist.
My new lover
& I are making out
at the laundry mart
but I want to climax
on the moon, a little
closer to God.
A wash boy finds $500
in the pocket
of his master’s tan trousers
—look at the joy
on his face!
The world is moving
fast. Fig trees forget
how privileged
they are—gulping
the water of new life
in almost every part
of the world.
My aunt was dying
in the hospital & God
looked at her
with his eyes, blinded
by lust for the trees
[my goodness, this sounds like blasphemy].
I bet she needed life,
not the figs. But I am not God
& I’m too lazy
to wield the world
in my hands.
My neighbor has bills
to pay. His mortgage
is morphing
his chest into a room,
clouded with diesel soot
—like the air, honeymooning
every surface
in Port Harcourt.
He might be alright,
or not.
The world is not stopping
for him.
I found
a peaceful spot & told
no one—it’s the sea—
when the sea sand tickles
my feet, I'm convinced
it’s the best & most affordable
pedicure capitalism is yet to discover
& steal from us.
I hate that I’ve shared
this secret with you.
I’ll pretend
the world doesn’t care.
With all the chaos
resting on the lintel
of this cold country,
I remember
that my dental
appointment is at 2 pm.
My tooth hurts.
*
NECESSARY EVIL
Anger can sometimes be an enquiry
into meaning. A week after you passed,
in a dream, I walked barefoot
for three days & deliberately left
sand prints on my father’s grey wool rug. It was
my attempt at seeing the color of my new identity
through his wrinkling eyes. I ate fufu
& lied to my mother about it being my new favorite
food. It was yours. One stormy evening,
a heavy wind shoveled our mango tree, the one
that sheltered you for over six decades & dumped it
at the entrance of our pavement. For days, I watched
you hide in the green then brown mango leaves—
withering, decomposing, & becoming earth.
