ROOM WITH A DROWNING BOOK  by Adeeko Ibukun (Nigeria)

 Somewhere in the room a book is drowning, the floor

is shivering with pages. You said the spine is the balance

to our two winged hearts. Sometimes it’s the light knitting

its letters to our hearts. I see how things hold us in their lights

so we aren’t here or there like you’re here and somewhere

a lover holds you in her heart, light in water teaching these lessons.

Sometimes something holds clearly what we couldn’t say in words.

We face it to learn our silence and that again becomes part of

our languages. Places own us like this, light bounces off them,

turning their spears at me. Our hearts beat now and vision takes

its shapes—the stream of consciousness, nuances as water turn,

streamlet as novella lost in our undercurrent.  I’m lost in a story now

or a story’s lost in me. Perhaps we should hang on words so that

we do not drown. Remembering makes living its anchor. So I asked

if it’s us you wanted to save insisting everything  is placed this way

and that way of our anniversaries, each moment  achieved  as light

buried in water—so it’s here or there, past or present, our chairs and tables,

dresser and records becoming the dykes. The mirror’s at an angle

to the world so it does not yield all its light at once. Everything’s our

subject before we become their subject, relying on memories to endure.

Evolution  by Tolase Ajibola  (Nigeria)

 (for adonis)

“A star is also

a pebble in the field of space” – Adonis

i

i like to write in circles,

circle is the shape of the sun

when it breaks through ocean doors;

the sun is the end of dreams.

dreams are images pushed in wooden carts,

cart is an idea of trees.

the moon writes endless verses

about the sun’s mood

in the night time.

ii

the moon gambles with me,

seven is his lucky number.

he sips beer after each win.

his moustache welcomes froth,

uncultured alcoholic draped in the mourning clouds

at a friend’s funeral.

i won’t be at the funeral

for time wins Olympics

and this friend reincarnates

iii

poetry lies with the sun,

within it are two rivers

one washes dreams,

the other poisons all things.

this ship doesn’t move,

it sank in the current of mood.

i cannot write too

the river is ink and

i am confused…