―after reading Rasaq
Here you become afraid of the radios & televisions. 
You do not want to be swallowed by their voices.
You do not want to be held by names dropping from their bellies.
Hauwa, she grew a garden, and harvested blasted bones. Abiodun, she went to the market 
and her breath faded in the smoke. Onyejeno, he saw a friend off near Okpokwu and 
was burned alive. Sochimma, she held a school of flowers and was pulsed through knives. 
Ehi’zogie, his brother’s body was placed into a lighted tire for kissing a boy. 
Ebuka, Olisa’s friend, drowned with the mangled bodies sprouting at his backyard. 
Onoriode, she admired the moon and was nailed down into a burlap for godheads. 
Odimegwu, he stepped out for a stroll and caught a halo of blood around his neck. 
There are many strings around here. 
So many winding roads; so many broken things.
 
Broken laughter. Broken nights. 
Broken rivers. Broken lives.
 
Here, manifestoes have no eyes or ears, and no pleasure and dreams they claim.
My father, his mouth opens the loudest at 9: for fucksake, just imagine! 
My mother dives for our ears, she doesn’t want us to overhear, fucking thieves! 
they hold elections with armed forces and fight terrorism with prayers. 
Last week, a man left a house and vanished at the waterfront. The week before 
last week, a village was razed down by bright edges of machetes, and Ak-47s. 
Say this is what you get for living in this place, for walking a country.
Here, you become afraid of everything every day.
 
Yet, every night I burn incenses before sleep,
hoping that each dawn will someday
bring a new smile here: where people will grow to age; 
where people can stay and fit in; where love will flower and bloom 
and where peace and unity will grow for people in here to stay as one.

sometimes when my body molts away 
from salvation   i always fold my self 
into brown letters- grandpa is a loosened 
memory; of sand, gravel, silver tiles & 
roses and the only way he's in our heart 
is the tales displayed on the news 
"injured soldiers, slaved citizens & colonized community"  

_abami eda plays on the radio_

My  deduction's never wrong. 
I say we're the remains of a forgotten 
massacred, masking scars & pains as a 
forlorn- a spook in chains of deserted dreams, 
as liveless dusts- fading history and I say 
Luther's dream has bent to this limelight. 

  & at times the etymology of broken bottles 
makes a tumescense hole in our hearts. 
say a man's hope is enveloped in a white A3 
with blood as label "we'd loved to but... "
he drank into the night, drain is the new home. 
as it is that hell to his body found 
its origin at  home. 

And most times, chasing after shadows seems
to be the way to grip our brother's collar, 
Knit our sisters into pinkish rainbow dreams
& wobble their eyes into household moon; 
watching as we lace our hands with magic, say:
-the rainbow is a beautiful poem in seven lines
-the thede's foundation is a rigid statue
-the paroxysm of happiness is contactable 
-& holding on is strength itself. 

Glossary
Thede - A nation
Abami Eda - Extraordinary being (in reference to Fela Anikulapo)