self-portrait as a boy languaging through fragmental spaces

my mouth shapes into an empty amen— 
like the last prayer stuck in my throat at my brother’s wake. 

in another version, i shape the poem into a [ ] 
& enjamb through it towards my brother. 
towards F. towards a comma. towards a full 
stop. there’s a lot to behold at the opening of a wound wor[l]d. 

10 am. i sit in a café – 6.4314° N, 3.4203° E  
& text my father in my mother tongue. 

in Yorùbá, the word for grief & loss only differs with their diacritical marks.
say grief òfò  / say loss: òfò 
tell me what incantation [ òfò ] could bring back all my dead. 

o wounded poem. 
look/ words are shapeshifters & they can morph 
into different meanings depending on the tone. 

in a dream, i’m back to the park searching for you. 
& there you are, with the other kids playing tag. i try to reach you
but i can’t. all i hear is a white noise & / 
something i’m yet to grasp fully. 

this makes no sense. 

because this is confessional. 

because i’m fluent in my father tongue 
 & spilling into another language. 

because i’ve been swimming through phases only to find  
my root’s in my mother’s ancestral hut. 

there is a scar on my left arm that reminds me of F. in our language,
scar is àpá / arm is apá
the scar, the size of a tonal mark, a memory. 

the truth is/ i blame myself for letting you go play in the park.
bitter truth: i should not [but i did]. the truth is/ my mother still tongues
your name at night/

 but no language can translate you back to life. 

remember there’s a lot to be– 
hold at the sight of a bullet wound. remember 
there’s a lot to hold at the sight of a bullet wound. 

look. sometimes i walk 
backwards/ with the hope to un-earth you/
un-funerate you/  write life back into the verse of your body. 

because God understands every language. 
 every sign & symbol. every sigh— 

because death is a door & the threshold is everywhere. 
& they walk right through it.

—Sodïq Oyèkànmí (Longleaf Review)

Close