Receiver I dream that I’m woken by the telephone. I dream the certainty that someone dead is calling. I dream that I reach for the receiver. Only the receiver’s not how it used to be, it’s gotten heavy as if it had grabbed onto something, grown into something, and wrapped its roots around it. I’d […]

Faisal Lyambee Aorabee —for Abdullahi 1. I saw the wrath of your zipper when we stopped for a piss in Mayo Dassa. The bald kuka tree gave up its birds when you howled in pain and walked back to the bus like a calf singing a strange surah with your teeth. 2. I am tired […]

Snow My father was a drunk. He married my mother the month he came back from Russia with whiskey in his blood. On their wedding night, he whispered into her ear about jet planes and snow. He said the word in Russian; my mother blinked back tears and spread her palms across his shoulder blades […]

THINGS by Fleur Adcock There are worse things than having behaved foolishly in public. There are worse things than these miniature betrayals, committed or endured or suspected; there are worse things than not being able to sleep for thinking about them. It is 5 a.m. All the worse things come stalking in and stand icily […]

all i’ll want you to do for both of us is to be a light be to us a candle burn slow, with humility protect the hearts of light and fluid don’t melt and drip and die on me care less about the colour; blue flame, yellow flame, white be to us a light for […]

the subjects are broken for they regret electing a king who can’t rule his own home one would have thought kings are fed with happenings so they digest his home – a mess; the kingdom too his chief sleeps with the first wife his son sleeps with the last were the gods asleep? how did […]

all I might have hated about myself I read on people’s lips, eyes and their gestures all what a man should not be I saw in people’s daily lives all of who I am and I’m not I’ve heard people conclude; so unless significant I wake up daily to hear, know, see and act like […]

A Dying World, lost in Smoke-filled screenplays Ploys, plots of darkness Celestial congestion Political disaster Hell preaching saints and saviour Save yourself from this messiness, Merciless tongue lashing liars Marketing to get food They offer deceit Remember son Pray always Death will Come. Victor Oyedele

wake! wake up reality checks on Monday when the desk is filled with nothing to do or everything can’t get enough of themselves so they bother you but there’s little to do when there’s nothing to do with self but work Monday is an alarm clock that rings only after Sunday evening rests get a […]

darkness lies in their light so they wander in frail emotions to them, every word is a wave of the sword they wear their eyes a lens of choices and adorn their lips with sentiments their ears choose what is right leaving their brains not to see lies another’s is tagged imprecise they become an […]