SEA-GLOPHONE
recently, i have been hearing my name often
from the sea. olókun becomes an elliptical tool
swearing to make connection with all that holds
water in my body. i sulked on my middle finger
to grow seafoods, then azures this colorless water
this is the chemistry behind yin and yang—all
the five chakra points in me opening through a
geometry of energy-wheels. i held a scalpel all
night, divided my body in two (upper body, lower
body), gave myself to the sea—like a blood moon
offering itself to a monsoon night. what i mean
is that the only sane way to get to the foot of the
sea is to turn the arms of the sea into a paddle-like.
this poem is full of sea-verses; oceanic stanzas,
metrical part of rowing, sesame oil, amniotic fluid
this is how i grew up: there’s always a calling to
the bar. this is an opened lap. a lip wet-sticked.
a polychromatic soaked body. here, have your
way. nobody told me even sea sounds well for
a middle name. anglophone? or, sea-glophone?
Ogun, 2023
HOMECOMING
you hate to say it, but you’re still a
stranger that looks the world from afar.
there are beautiful gallows at each piazza
that opens the route to the royal family
—this path is dubbed by belladonna &
foxglove. Tell, which step shall you take
through the wild that won’t get you
vervained &; chillied like a bald warbler
at random nights where the beads on your
waist, nor the cowries shall jingle a sound
but your tongue isn’t safe, lingo rolls on
a wheel off your jaws & notes of sounds
are picked like tulips & cactuses. Brace
yourself up, wish everything you love adieu.
you’ve disked yourself out of your body,
the tunes you hum is of the west life. Your
home does not own you again, you’re but
a coiled snake in a sink that rambles words
as bubbles. Nobody hears you again,
you might just check your leg for the juice
of hemlock on your right sole & for
your left, buttercup is spilled all herein.
we don’t jeer our hands to curl up stained
fallen heroes around our cocoons. The lips
we once kiss you with, throw spits at you
now. No homecoming herein, yeah?
Ogun, 2021
Saheed Sunday, NGP V, is a Nigerian poet and HCAF member. His works appear in Shrapnel Magazine, Rough Cut Press, The Temz Review, Brittle Paper and elsewhere.
www.twitter.com/poetsundaysaheed