<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You are the relic of a city.
\nI learnt the history of your body
\nthreading the city borders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You say stories are what we make of living,
\nI found yours in the language of fire.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In your stories, there are so many ways to kill a girl,
\nyou mentioned salt on your skin
\nand how you were jihadi roast.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There are lessons only fire may teach:
\nwe too, like some stones,
\nmay burn our sins to be jewels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I dream of those who fled the inferno
\nbearing the weight of night.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Unable to speak, they hold water
\nin their mouths in an attempt
\nto dissolve the language on their tongues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In consciousness they are not part of us,
\nwe are numbers, you say,
\nand the words become a bird of flight. Near vision<\/p>\n\n\n\n
a bird perches on a twig and you claim its sorrow
\nknowing its home held the fire that burnt yours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You open your palm before the bird
\nas if to give it its song. I ask,
\nwhere shall we go?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The bird knows, you say,
\nthe sky has abandoned all its colours
\nthat it may have us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The girls sat in the truck with their fears
\nclutched to their chests. They adopted silence<\/p>\n\n\n\n
as though it were the language of sacrificial lambs.
\nThey heard the rafters crack from fire, they watched<\/p>\n\n\n\n
the matron\u2019s body wriggle as though to object to dying
\nafter her neck was slit. The new master ordered the truck to move.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They turned into the dark. The first girl who spoke
\nasked Alimatu what silence meant in her language.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Alimatu\u2019s silence is the language of her brother
\nwho died at the polls. It\u2019s their argot of grief.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Her mother will learn it.
\nShe will teach it to other mothers,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
but now they wait. They wait
\nfor the truck to come to rest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The next passenger isn\u2019t much of a talker,
\nshe has a finger trapped between a book.
\nNo doubt she\u2019s had more education than I got in the army.
\nIn a mix of Gamai and barrack pidgin I tell a story
\nin which I put Bensil\u2019s intestine back into the hollow of his stomach,
\nthe sun caught in his flinching eyes. I lean back into my seat,
\nAsa\u2019s Fire on the mountain comes on radio, the next passenger sings along:
\nI see an army of a soldier man\/ marching across the street.
\nI have seen it too, Post-Election Tudun Wada
\nbullets\u2019 tips prodded a boy\u2019s ribcage,
\ndeflated his lungs and his balloons.
\nHer voice breaks: there will be nowhere for us to go.
\nI tell her what I remember of the Yelwa we are approaching,
\nI tell her about the green of her gardens that\u2019s home to birds.
\nI tell her of butterflies and milkweeds, the red breasts of robins.
\nI tell her of my joy in the seasons of rain
\nwhen the geese have arrived with their silent white peace.
\nBefore I settled into the story, she says there\u2019s been two elections.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
for Kofi Awonoor<\/em> He says Begin with things we fail to remember the red stilettos a child dreams to return in. The little class dismisses. I am awed by the frame as Kofi slips into silence perhaps, here is where he found the language how Kofi had exploded into tiny bits of stars. Perhaps this is how you test the waters, who will receive you at the station? except the dust you have become? In Libya, they wait in the belly of a boat this is the longest night. They wait of Spain where they will be games waits. He says Javier, two bottles of cognac They wait. Outside the boat, trade negotiations southern Nigeria. A man stops to promise himself She tells it to hold for Black Sisters\u2019 Street in Brussels. Someone suggests they pray the boat moves, Upon meeting a Girl in Baga You are the relic of a city. I learnt the history of your body threading the city borders. You say stories are what we make of living, I found yours in the language of fire. In your stories, there are so many ways to kill a girl, you […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":3775,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3760","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mtls.ca\/issue24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3760","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mtls.ca\/issue24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mtls.ca\/issue24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mtls.ca\/issue24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mtls.ca\/issue24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3760"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/mtls.ca\/issue24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3760\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4150,"href":"https:\/\/mtls.ca\/issue24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3760\/revisions\/4150"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mtls.ca\/issue24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3775"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mtls.ca\/issue24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3760"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mtls.ca\/issue24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3760"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mtls.ca\/issue24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3760"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nand when my father fell to death<\/em>
\na field dried out, a sparrow fled<\/em>
\n\u2014Adonis
\nI imagine Kofi teaching a poetry class<\/em>
\nbefore he gave his name to a vocabulary of loss.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nthe book shelves and their galaxy of dust,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nI have come here not knowing what to find.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nof this moment holding me and the stars as witness<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nas though it were a kind of prayer,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nto negotiate his loss. I imagine now<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nWhat do I know of travelers who go in bits?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nan arm here, a foot there. Kofi,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nwho will share your sorrow<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nEven the birds have flown, nothing lives here
\nonly memory.<\/p>\n\n\n\nWaiting<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\nso dark they are tempted to believe<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nfor the vessel to take them to the south coast<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nfor border patrol officers. There, Hugo<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nyou don\u2019t hit ten niggers in twelve shots.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nhold. They sing the psalms they\u2019ve brought from<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nto reach London, another sister speaks to her body.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nThey won\u2019t know they are captives yet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\nthey join their hands, shut their eyes and wait.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"