ISSN: 1941-4137
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
Salawu Olajide’s poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Salt Hill, New Orleans Review, Paragrammer, Tradition, Rattle, Saraba, Miracle Monocle, Forbidden Peak Press, Soul-Lit and so on. He is also the author of Preface for Leaving Homeland, published under African Poetry Book Fund series edited by Kwame Dawes and Chris Abani. He lives in Ile-Ife, Nigeria.
Poets Resist
Edited by Alicia Cole
March 26, 2020
Edited by Alicia Cole
March 26, 2020
A Silent Column for Henriatta Alokha
A crane also performs motherhood
and adopts grief when it sees other birds
fleeing the field of furnace.
Deep inside me,
I know the anguish of a mother
searching for unknown daughters
under the rubbles and
the flaming veins of this city.
They say a raging fire does not know the arson’s face,
so I know what it means to carry a burnt body
beside an ocean and still become a jar of ashes.
I don’t know what my heritage can be
in this land where we are waiting for the next
moment for the bell to chime and for god’s face
to break out of the greying sky.
Therefore I am asking again, how long shall
I dig for more water beside the tide
of blood that swallows this city?
Poets Resist is published by Glass Poetry Press.
All contents © the author.
All contents © the author.
