Down the cane field of my heart, forsythias
are blooming. Petals reddening. It’s the universe
saying I am only one threshold close to a ripe dawn.
I have done it before. Stepping into joy
like a pilgrim. But there’s another
dimension to this where the ocean doesn’t
puke the whale out of pure neglect. It is
the miracle of hands that grants the
conjurer a success of magic, not his wits.
That I do it this way & a genuine smile
guts my face like a market in a fire
is not an evidence of my defeat against
sorrow or anything close to it. I don’t
have the balls for it. I barely have
the balls for anything. I happen to just be a token
of Mercy. I lean into the piano, there is a lot of music
inside me unstruck yet, but I am getting there.
The pianist is getting there – why do you think I chose
this path where loss exhausts ink before you
put the pen to paper? I am still here alive – a fancy watch
God won’t take His eyes off. A meadow with
foxgloves around it like a frightened night in the
guidance of purple stars. It surprises you an elegy
doesn’t burst forth, it stuns me too.
The light I bear inside me is enough Eden.
There’s no more to say about how I continue to break
the hour-hand of suicide.
I fold myself, a cat, in the warm arms of my
lover. & so, we spend the night – dancing to delicate hymns.
Note: The title is from Ocean Vuong’s poem “Queen Under the Hill”.
Eniolá Abdulroqeeb Arówólò is a writer from Nigeria and a member of the Frontiers Collective. A Pushcart nominee, his works have appeared or are forthcoming in 4faced Liar, ANMLY, Fourth River Review, Consequence Forum, Rulerless, Perhappened, Lumiere Review, Temz Review, Ake Review, Sunlight Press, Kissing Dynamite, Brittle Paper, Tint Journal, Rough Cut Press, Lammergeier, and elsewhere. He was shortlisted for Chukwuemeka Akachi Prize, and currently serves as a Poetry Contributing Editor for Barren Magazine. He tweets at @eniola_abdulroq