PRAYER: AIR by Pamilerin Jacob

PRAYER: AIR by Pamilerin Jacob

by | Oct 27, 2019 | ISSUE, Issue - Poetry

PRAYER: AIR

by Pamilerin Jacob

breathing mindfully, you are
already finding a refuge in your breath…

–         Thich Nhat Hanh

was it not Simone Weil who said

of prayer:     an attention absolutely unmixed…

my brother prays in the holy ghost

I too, pray in something holy      corporeal

these lungs, tireless as a turbine

churn     my thoughts

blobby         see, I

too rebuke darkness by panting

23,040 times a day      cathedral of awareness

I am the straightening of pleats    warm breath

filling the day’s apertures.    & 

in church

when the pastor says           pray, I breathe

deeply       count the hairs on my middle finger

as they rise somewhere in the follicles, a

man is heaving, prostrate. an

 

executioner’s blade midair

about to cure Africa of one less apostate

&—the man—he pays attention     

only

to his breath.

Source: From the Rebel Issue (October 2019)

PRAYER: AIR

by Pamilerin Jacob | POEMS

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

PAMILERIN JACOB is a Nigerian poet whose poems have appeared in Barren Mag, Agbowo, Poetry Potion, & forthcoming in Rattle. He was the second runner-up for Sevhage Poetry Prize 2019.  Author of Memoir of Crushed Petals & chapbooks, Gospels of Depression, & Paper Planes in the Rain (Co-authored); he is a staunch believer in the powers of critical thinking, Khalil Gibran’s poetry & chocolate ice-cream.

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A RUINED CANDLE WAX STILL BREATHES ITSELF INTO SHAPE by Ugochukwu Damian

A RUINED CANDLE WAX STILL BREATHES ITSELF INTO SHAPE by Ugochukwu Damian

by | Oct 27, 2019 | ISSUE, Issue - Poetry

A RUINED CANDLE WAX STILL BREATHES ITSELF INTO SHAPE

by Ugochukwu Damian

i’ve lost count of the queer bodies burnt this way           

  i’ve also lost count on how many queer bodies

                                                       it will take river niger

 to quench the thirst of onitsha men and women

 

                                                             like water, we take shape

           douse our light

& brew colors

                          for our bodies hold a spectrum

 

                                              ozomena         my lover

                        says nothing would happen here

                   let’s puff our pride like cigarettes

                                                 and then wear it like a halo

 

         we hold hands

& tremor becomes the impulse

trudging through our bodies

                                                                        although    we are in south africa,

                                                 a bird remembers its way home

                                                                what happens when the owner destroys its nest

 

 

                   i want to hold unto him

                                                     like a figurine holding unto dust in kaduna

inhaling the harmattan air

 

                                                                   i know   a rainbow is an anagram

for any color it wants to be

                        we will make nigeria out of it

 

in my dreams

my feet no longer spell fear

nor jail

nor death

everyday i wake to ozomena

molding nigeria into shapes of tolerance

he is hopeful like a mother

awaiting her only son after a war

Source: From the Rebel Issue (October 2019)

A RUINED CANDLE WAX STILL BREATHES ITSELF INTO SHAPE

by Ugochukwu Damian | POEMS

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

UGOCHUKWU DAMIAN OKPARA is a poet based in Nigeria. He began writing poetry in 2017 and his major theme explores gender and sexuality. His goal is to inspire those who have been hurt, making them realize that the light at the end of the tunnel is not an illusion. He was one of the 21 mentees in the second cohort of the SLM Mentorship programme. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Woven words, African writer, Kreative Diadem, Straight Forward Poetry and more.

A REPUBLIC OF WILDNESS by Michael Akuchie

A REPUBLIC OF WILDNESS by Michael Akuchie

by | Oct 27, 2019 | ISSUE, Issue - Poetry

A REPUBLIC OF WILDNESS

by Michael Akuchie

I mean to wear my hair like a slice cut from a collision. 

Different from normal people, a republic of wildness.

Out in the streets, they catcall, whistle & hurl stones

existing in the currency of insult.

My folks raise a storm of abuse with no shelter

to keep warm when the wind in their lungs snuffs out itself.

At this point, they leave me & a smile widens

the corners of my mouth. 

When I tell them I want to love a woman,

what my father wants is a gun.

When I tell them I could never master love

for a man, my mother rehearses a sermon.

They enforce curfews & sing along with

the preacher on TV. I sit with a blazing heart & a hunger

for the rest of the world, a desire for the euphoria a kiss provides.

A fruit forbidden from touch but not from thought.

Source: From the Rebel Issue (October 2019)

A REPUBLIC OF WILDNESS

by Michael Akuchie | POEMS

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

MICHAEL AKUCHIE is a Nigerian poet who is currently pursuing a degree in English and Literature at the University of Benin, Nigeria. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming at The Impossible Task, Sandy River Review, Headway Lit, Rabid Oak, The Hellebore, Peculiars Magazine and elsewhere. He is a Contributing Editor at Barren Magazine. His micro-chapbook, Calling Out Grief is forthcoming with Ghost City Press (July 2019). He is on Twitter as @Michael_Akuchie. 

PLAN FOR MY ONE WILD AND PRECIOUS LIFE by Laura Kaminski

PLAN FOR MY ONE WILD AND PRECIOUS LIFE by Laura Kaminski

by | Oct 27, 2019 | ISSUE, Issue - Poetry

PLAN FOR MY ONE WILD AND PRECIOUS LIFE

by Laura Kaminski

poem honoring, and with lines from, Mary Oliver, 17-January-2019

 

The complexities were beyond me, I couldn’t

seem to get beyond the split infinitive

and comma splice, the English grammar that

matters so much when spit-polishing a poem.

I couldn’t see the point in layering allusion,

 

metaphor, and simile so thickly over the top

of a small seed of meaning that it didn’t

stand a chance of sprouting and finding its way

up to the surface through the dirt. Wanted

to write, but had the misimpression: poems had

to always be in fancy-dress, lines always had

to be exactly five feet long. Then your

poems found me, offered invitation: just say

what you mean, best you can, informally, your

readers are your friends, you’re together in

the garden, working, weeding, mulching.

 

So this is what I plan to do with my one wild

and precious life. Say it simple. Low-growing.

Humble. Don’t so much look for accolades as give

them, honor human becoming and green-tongue leaf

and purple petal. Oh, violets, you did signify,

and what shall take / Your place?

Source: From the Rebel Issue (October 2019)

PLAN FOR MY ONE WILD AND PRECIOUS LIFE

by Laura Kaminski | POEMS

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

LAURA M. KAMINSKI (HALIMA AYUBA) grew up in northern Nigeria, went to school in New Orleans, and currently lives in rural Missouri. She is an Editor at Right Hand Pointing, and also serves as Poetry Editor for Praxis Magazine Online, where she curates the digital chapbook / Around This Fire response-chapbook series.

STRIDES OF MUSIC by Lucky Labaya

STRIDES OF MUSIC by Lucky Labaya

by | Oct 26, 2019 | ISSUE, Issue - Poetry

STRIDES OF MUSIC

by Lucky Labaya 

That music should

pace as slow as possible.

 

That what should sail

into ears are stroked strings

of a guitar.

That haste in it means defiance

rides on its meter—

 

That if it hurries: it isn’t

of the rising dust of stamping feet.

That it isn’t good

for where cartilage narrows.

                   –

What

crawls out of some lips is: so

long it thuds hard and it is

impatient enough to pace

hurriedly, it needn’t be given

a listen.

                   –

What about the ones

that now broaden their cheeks from

years of bowing heads after

NF’s tune found its way

into their headphones?

 

What would have been of

them when they did make yeah

a refrain that overrode their thoughts

as they kept facing the ceiling while

toasting a dice on the floor,

contemplating what a single

squeal could do.

Source: From the Rebel Issue (October 2019)

STRIDES OF MUSIC

by Lucky Labaya | POEMS

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

LUCKY LUBAYA is a poet and fiction writer who writes from Zambia. He pens poems to have a better understanding of the world and to smear different emotions on paper and his word app. If not writing, he spends his time taking a reasonable stroll and finding delight in stuff that fits being art.

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