in between walls that keep strangling my portrait,
i'm a boy on a sleeveless errand, a futile journey,
or an extended metaphor for serial rejection & failure.
my days hinge on the broken wings of a bird in agony.
grief is a name for everything that breaks a boy:
into syllables, into a yodel with fluctuating falsettos
in the mouth of a widow, into the last flickers of light
from a dying flame. tonight, i'm a trapped nightingale
learning to sing a new guttural song. for hooked fish
gasping for breath never wag its tail in mirth.
life is but a scary nightmare of a lost paradise.
living is a mere hallucination of allegorical images.
death is a threshold leading to elysium — my long
awaited messiah. take me into your arms of darkness
— enwrap me in a golden sepulchre. lead me
on a pilgrimage in a chariot of white horses racing home.
JAMIU AHMED is a Lagos-based Nigerian Writer and Blogger. He has several works featured and forthcoming on digital literary platforms such as Eboquills, Poemify, The Quills, The Consio Magazine, The Mexodus, Artmosterrific & elsewhere. His writings have also performed well in competitions organised by Poets in Nigeria (PIN) and Word Rhymes and Rhythm.