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Ogunkoya Samuel

I wish there were other things

I wish there were other things

                                                                                than this silence sometimes

Filling my mouth or the occasional

                                     Blurt of a diagnosis

Spelling

each syllable as though they are

                                                                wiping    wiping

wiping

          every form of life from

This woman                                 draped with a blue chiffon

This woman                                 in her usual state of health      

                                                       until 4 days ago when she complained

                 Of a chest pain

-- Read as heartbreak/hurt/an unexplainable sensation secondary to the death of someone whose name she can no longer say-

                                     I don’t know why she

                                               Keeps calling me Lazarus.

But there is nothing in her face

That looks like hope.

                                                           Even when I told her death could wait till tomorrow.


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Ogunkoya Samuel is a Nigerian Physiotherapist. His poems have appeared and forthcoming on Kalahari Review, Ellis Review, Soft Cartel, Entropy Magazine, Five2One magazine, Minute Magazine, Best New African Poets anthology (2017) amongst other places. He writes from Ibadan and can be reached on Twitter @SamuelOgunkoya.

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