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Let Me Gently
my father was one of
the reasons why i never
wanted to become rich
my brother & i would sit on the gelid
concrete floor to listen to him
boast
& it was always the same.
he never voted for APC &
he always lost…because his radio
never made a ‘shhssshhhh!!’
my
father believed in lost causes:
bets,
Biafra, government, my Ma
a cautionary tale could suffice
for a man like my father
i liked my father because he
did what I wouldn’t do
& my brother liked him like that
too
is it the buzzing mosquitoes he
killed with his palms clasped
together in the big city of Lagos
where we slept?
& sometimes he would hold up
his bet slip & he would say:
“Ure, i think Chelsea will
win today…”
& Chelsea would always lose
& the alley cats would go on to be the
screamers that night because
father would hurl all his brandy bottles
at them
in the streets…
& he would shout, like mad
& my brother would cry so much
& i would pace fifty kilometers
to the station to call the police on
my father; & they’d say:
“let me—
for this frustration eats me
and eats you too”
Like Twilight Edging Out of Day
I used to hide behind my
Grandfather’s shelf to espial
My little lilies grow.
Awestruck & mostly dejected
Because I never got till the end.
See
I loved the thought of being
Witness to something as
Graceful as my flowers
The bud-nipping early, betwixt
The middle of March.
Corseted
& trammeled to watch the flower
Grow. Move. An inch. Or two.
& I would stand there all night
Long. Daring the flowers to move
Their sepals or shed their innumerable Petals
Into the water. But they always
Grew; & I never witness them.
Sleep was a more humbler
Experience. Nature couldn’t be
Force either way: sleep & blossoming
Flowers.
Of Dream Mags, Little Wins, and Acceptances
& i walk under their vestibule
at a deluge of golden
light,
the array of rejected images i
witness recoil and render me inert &
smitten with love
even in this seemingly rebarbative niche.
for they have graced my charms
with their viscid smile
letting me have those little
victories & never berating me
& with impunity, have
have looked upon my
lowly works
& in them, seen sparks
& i have in turn hurled on them praises,
like Agamemnon,
with blood-splattered ink
on papyrus decor
Prosper Ifeanyi is a writer and student of English and Literary Studies in Delta State University, Abraka. His works are featured/forthcoming in Salamander Ink Magazine, Afrocritik, Nantygreens, Bluepepper, Anotearthub, Kalahari Review, The Temz Review and elsewhere. He is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of OneBlackBoyLikeThat Review, a literary blog which curates works of art and literary oeuvres around Africa. Reach him on Twitter and Instagram @prosperifeanyii respectively.