By Timi Sanni
(I sit before a mirror in suit, before a reflection
that paints fantasy on my body of nightmares)
-Tell me about yourself
What you see is a wilted plant, a sorry flower
My first father was a flower who lost his petals
in the field of living, the second sold his fragrance
for a home in this country, then came home
to refugee children carrying the putrid smell of death
I rather tell of grief
Do you know what the tears of eleven children taste like
when they are shed beside the grave of a broken mirror?
(the mirror wears a puzzle of
confusion upon its four-cornered face)
-So, how do you see success?
How I see pain, or the absence of it
How I see the numbness that ravages my being
when all that is left in my eyes are salt crystals
when my body hides the ocean
that runs within my veins, to keep the promise of living
-What is your dream?
I am drinking milk & honey
in that lush garden, east of Eden
that carries the scent of my homeland before
it began to carry bombshells, bullets
& the remains of my brothers in its womb
–in a land where nectar bursts
upon my burnt tongue,
where I blossom among glorious flowers
like a beautiful agony
where Sabbath finds me everyday
in a dream within another dream
Reality is ugly to my mind’s eye
-Where do you see yourself in the next five years?
A [ ] died today
& [ ] never saw it coming
What are we if not threads in the tapestry of fate?
& five years is too long a time not to think of death
Say, you wake up one day to find me
beneath the soles of your feet. I mean
a cop could bury me within his mistake
it doesn’t matter that already
I am a dead living upon a walking stick, I mean
A walking stick could be taken for a gun, right?
-Why do you live?
because when a man carries the souls of seven children
within: (i) a broken body, (ii) the promise of bread
he realizes that the hunger of seven bellies is enough death
because when they make music out of a man’s death
he vows his last blood in a second coming
to break the flutes & beat the drums to destruction
© Timi Sanni
Undivided Magazine 