Songs of Anisha
chopping protruding bits of human anatomy. Raping women:
whether grannies or teenagers long before the dawn of womanhood
I find it hard to believe it’s my home
It is in Africa
So while I curl up comfortably in this Western land
With no worries beyond what to wear tonight or gawping
At the trivial gossip of some stranger’s sex life or drug habit
I should remember my home
In Sierra Leone, West Africa
“In The Gloom,”
by Adebayo Akinloye
the genesis of an undergrowth
an offshoot out of the depth of darkness
the revelation of a nightly firmament
an implosion from the heart of the heavens
metamorphosis of meaning in space
lightning thunderclaps of storm
cumulus of clouds wind of sandstorm
fifth a whistle of hurried breeze
preparing the way for the sixth
a surge of deluge
helpless fragile bloom in the gloom
of an unsparing storm
a violent blow to the right
another to the left
a vicious shove forward
wicked one to the back
in the heat of the scorching storm
the bloom is bowed bent but not broken.
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