Image Credit: MW When I was young My mother told me secrets She discovered in the magic box Of her late father — buried deep in the balcony. She said I was born a shaman With Aramaic wands on my palms Everything I touch turns to stars My mother’s half-sister turned into a rainbow As she tried kissing me. I spread my palms, dreaming in … Continue reading A Shaman Tells His Memoir
At the backyard— There is a convocation of potties with broken and happy Faces. On the line— There is a soaked wrapper that throws the fragrance of urine in the air. In the latrine room— The chickens’ cages breed mites with biceps. There’s a makeshift kitchen at every door- step. We know what our neighbors will eat for dinner. The passage of the rooms— an … Continue reading Face-Me-I-Face-You
I am as brittle as a piece of broom, & so are you, & so are they. This is why we could be broken when not gathered. This is why our city is never clean when it is swept. I know I am a way to the sky. When hiked out of me, you are the next door, & they are the other doors. I’m saying the journey to the sky begins from you, to me, & to them. But I wouldn’t know if anyone has gotten to the sky all by themselves. Let them come, let’s see the measure of breath laced on his life. Let’s see the lives that have grown out of his life. Let’s see the windows opened from his heart to people’s heart, even when their bodies are away from one another, & their blood isn’t the same. Let’s see how poor he could be, that all he has is the riches of the sky, when others are tremendously gathering one another, needing one another. Not in a way a dog needs a bone, but in the way a human needs breath. Opeyemi Oluwayomi is a Nigerian writer, an English & Literary student of University of Ibadan. His works have appeared or are forthcoming on Heart of Flesh Literary Journal, Ink Sweat & Tears, Art Lounge Journal, Brittle Paper, Shallow Tales Review, Ekstasis Magazine, Eboquil Magazine, SpringNG, … Continue reading The Concept of Us
“I know this path like the story beneath my name,
I know it much like the pulse within my body—
a dance with destiny in a shapeless room full of men.”
In this chapter, we all wear the crown of defeat,
sculpted from reality’s broken hopes.
Love is not a contest to win. It’s all but a losing game.” Continue reading Archaeology Of The Heart
Image credit: Evie.S/unsplash Your aura teaches a boy how to blossom into a flower, how to wear a new form—one as soft as the body of water. This boy, once solid, has become a tender delicacy, yearning for your taste. Once fierce, now still. Once astray, now on track. Say, I detach myself from this lion’s fur to become a dove, to lay in the cradle arms of love, and call you … Continue reading The Aura Of You
ArtisansQuill| Celebrating Wordcraft 