A PATH THAT WINDS IN TO THE CLOUDS

Oko, labe igi oronbo
A path that winds into the clouds
In loving memory of broken cisterns that squirt.
The very moan of trees
Rises to ninth heaven in praise,
Of the cat that died
Dousing the rampaging fire running in your tap

ABUJA (7)

Abuja, I need you now, more than ever; 

Where's your love?

I'm left alone amongst twains

ABUJA (6)

Abuja, I need a call to the heart; 

Touch me with thy whisper; 

Cringe my skin with thy touch

ABUJA (5)

Abuja, thou has forsaken me;

Left, lorn, love lost, longing;

Amidst infidelity that overcrowds

LORD OF ALL FEARS

Feet don’t fail me now

My demons becloud again

Wont for more than we bargained

Poke me dream, will you?

Dally your barrage of goodies –

Me of fairies treat

For my placebo smolders

Surety and party, locked at Doom

Like the flogged of bush-babies to penury

Fairy or djin, hunt me the lantern

Gold and silver to my feet

Love and power – the heart’s fill afterwards

INITIATION

I sit half awake, half amok
Carried away by the chants
Of empty scary black masks
Droning chants of nineteenth century druids
Seasonal migrants to our lands
Coming with the birds to breed
Souls and life taken with them.
On the day gboya* and I made four
Exchanges of souls, oaths cursed
Dust mixed with the ceremonial broth
Cooking at the square, now four days
Humans used to skin drums
Bones made in to khalils^
remnants end up as bodily markings
Away to a place strange
Where dementors are harmless
And back through an interswitch
here am ushered in to manhood.

* - masquerade in Nupe (A Nigerian dialect)
^ - A Jewish flute