poetry column-nnd

I die like waves

By Daniel Orisaeke On the shoreline, I watch the sun—a halved-cut lemon dip into the sea, language written in the dance of waves there is a pull and I succumb. The man beside me murmurs a few words about dying.…

Prayer at the Sea

By Agunbiade Kehinde Definitions belong to the definers — Toni Morrison Dawn is an open book for the hopes of travellers.They say by the time it breaks with its pitcher of boon,And the secrets of its rites of passage,Let them…

odim hill is a flight risk

By Precious Okpechi there’s a kite testing how fast it needs to glideto halt a cloud in space; a light travelling acrossthe globe like saturn’s wedding ring; the small town below looks like a network of dendrites: a littlegreen here…

what moves now, lord?

by tosin gbogi  what does the sea bring back to me now​ what does it wash ashore in its nude song of crossing​ and what floats on its frothing face, butterflying with the tide . . . ​ the light of…

Teaching my father how to fish

By Olatunde Osinaike Getting to know him in the interim, and the gulf of prepositions describing the relative he has been to the two younger than me. Around, against, beyond, concerning, without, notwith- standing: all of the ways we have…

Cutting ties with the cyborg

By Abdulrazaq Salihu At a lab in NASA, I sprawl my fingers On all the keys that could undo the deed Of misconception and miscalculation Like water does to  dry land — revive its glory. My mistakes transpire from my…

The Forfeit of Language

By Fatihah Quadri Eniola There is no swathe that holds the slender back of hope, no truss to prehend its clavicles from break- opening. I bend the knee, seconds crash what ladders me to God. My grandma’s radio returning her…

Sleep Ghazal

By Blessing Omeiza Ojo At the IDP camp, where my kitten wouldn’t agree to sleep, I laid, missing my home, my mattress and sweet sleep. Mosquitoes wouldn’t quit the making of music in my ears. Afterward, they sucked me. It…