The Way I go Towards You

C.K. Danjuma

For H

Like July in full bloom,
I have seen the hibiscus petals on the field 
open themselves to want.
It’s the same way memory opens the body 
To what wounds it. 

I must learn how to stop mourning you,
I must close my eyes
& pretend the knifed memory dulls the flesh it cut.

This poem is how I know remembrance is the way
God turns us to all the rooms 
we have struggled to walk out of:

The world quietening into the first time we stepped 
Into our desire; arm in arm—
You & I. My name, a seed sprouting 
from your wet-loamed mouth. 

This time, we give the night what belongs to it:
Desire free from rust & birdsongs. 
The body in its mercy for forbidden things 
must lay itself bare for planting,
sprinkling of raspberry seeds,
milking of millets. Ryegrasses

asking for proof of our breaths: 
Half winged angels, cicadas & katydids
listening in on a familiar hunger,
their synth, a botanical response.

Unlike you, I do not forget where the blade glistens. 
I stare into the purpled wound 
& watch the petals grow into a spine,
extends a hand & gathers me.
The way I open into what closes me.

BIO:

C.K Danjuma is a Nigerian writer, essayist and lawyer. His poems and essays have appeared in The Guardian, Agbowo, African Writer, Rising Phoenix, Jalada, Jacar Press and elsewhere.