A Corn in the Bottle
No one stands on grinding stone &
wage wars against it, no one does!
No one dwells on mortal & plot
evils against it, no one dares!
Whoever wishes me dead should die
before time, ripe and unripe.
Orijin leaf commands you to overlook
my errs, sango isn’t responsible for
Whoever thunder strikes,
My acts, henceforth, become unquestionable.
Today, I become a corn in the bottle,
I’m farther beyond enemies’ reach.
Thousands of cutlasses & thousands of
hoes that wage war against hill,
It conquers them all,
May I outshine my foes.
How Nights Harbour Our Scars
Where I come from,
Night isn’t where to close minds,
Pillow heads, & count stars.
It’s where occupants are on queues,
awaiting their death. Here,
Night is but the reincarnation of the
grief broad day has dawned upon us.
I don’t know of other places. But here,
night is when we tutor our young ones,
We teach ’em how to grieve over loved
ons’ death. It’s when we teach them how to
dig graves, bury friends & mourn their exit.
Every night, here, is a candle night,
This is our we mourn our loved one;
We kneel down beside their graves &
wish we were them, the ones in grave.
As much as it hurts to bereave a friend,
Life’s been messy enough not to be
worthy of our hot, & bitter tears.
Fadairo Tesleem is a young Nigerian poet that writes from Ilorin, Kwara state. He is a teacher, a poetry coach, and a literary critic. Tesleem is a final year student of the Kamal School of Arabic and Islamic studies in Ilorin. He is a member of Hill-Tip Creative Art Foundation, Kwara State Branch, and is also a member of the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA), Osun state branch. His poems are published or forthcoming in Fiery Scribe Review, Pangolin Review, Queer Toronto Literary Magazine, Arts Lounge, Best of Africa, Blue Minaret, Down in the Dirt, Ninshãr Arts, Blue Pepper, Upwrite Magazine, Inverse Journal, Eremite Poetry, and a host of others. He Tweets here.
