phantom
By Rahma O. Jimoh i hold this place with all of its blue waters, dazzling sunlight, tulips & bougainvillea— i transcend into water, curl around fleets of flowers. like a creek, unafraid, i pour into others & the sea mirrors the sky’s…
poetry column
Red
By Georgie Your mother sprawls Like a petition left unanswered At an altar. You calculate if this pregnancy Outweighs her body— you imagine How it must be to lift something inside Other than yourself. You shake her fragile body Just…
Cicatrix
By Chinedu Gospel For Mariam every time / my name escapes / from your windpipe / it’s as if I’ve been drowning / inside your air sacs / all my life / & you’ve been pushing me out / like…
Ode to the lust for life
By Anthony Okpunor I think memories to keep the body. I write about the day as what endures the night. something about dreaming is a lie— the blue line above your head is a puzzle of not remembering. still, sometimes,…
After a Conversation about Janazah with S in a Dream
By Abu Bakr Sadiq I wake drunk on the smell of my kufi liquefying under sunlight I touch the sea under my eyes hoping to pick wishbones from its bed I watch a cat fight for its life as it…
i’m here, mother i’m here
By Taiwo Hassan in this poem, fire wears the essence of its irony and i’m drowning. touch this skin, there’s a home burning in each of its pores. make no mistake, these ashes are not meant to be unburnt, so…
32 portraits of a boy
By Emmanuel Ojeikhodion an armistice fails to reconcile the war-zones of my body. there is a big war within that doesn’t die. no one watches when I split like a burning house. nobody listens to the grief rattling my bones.…
Bungee-jumping
By Omodero David Oghenekaro By the green River, I watched the Orange-breasted kingfisher plunge, beak-first for water, to perform the acrobatics of hunger. Show me a hunger that is not dangerous; show me a desire not taking The frame of…
Silent Voice of Regret
By Fatima Ahmad Usman You are a lonely street at night holding death beneath the cover of black silence. Regret speaks not too loudly – indistinct her voice, still, she speaks. Remember when Halima told you “as a girl, To…
in a country ready to bleed you dead
after Romeo Oriogun By Elias Udòchi Andrevn pray in little spaces wild enough for a dream. & in deep sarcophagi of your body, stew remnants flush with heaven. god’s beard rove with burning crystals are the colors after which we…