You are your mother
Journal Entry:25th June 2020
Until we absolve ourselves, make ourselves see ourselves in the past. Until we go back to
whatever festers us, break the chain it has on us, we will always return.
When you begin to look like your mother / it starts with a smile / that curves into a banana / waiting to undress / & you begin to sink / to wither everything you want to wither / to mould everything you want to mould / you imagine her lips to be malleable metal / bending at your will / before it parts to reveal you / one by one / you by your mother / over and over / as
the start of / a carefree laugh / a soothing laugh /
/ hooks you /
& you comb yourself in her distress / the two of you at ‘07 / housing / thick black hair / plaiting the nights / with your footprints / the two of you now / hoping to fly / to flee / to forget / to remember / & repel / the two of you / everyday / staring into blankness that is birth / looking / at the laugh / that now calcifies / hooks your ears / creates a depression / breaks you / regurgitates you / over and over / retching / as it contracts / over and over / slowly / quietly / it / makes / you / slip away.
Funmilayo Obasa, a non-fiction writer, poet, and photographer is passionate about documenting muffled stories with her art. Writing from Kwara, Abuja, or whichever place she finds herself, her words tend to paint the spontaneity of her imagination, humanity & equality [for all], desires, and emotions, in abstract ways, forging a relationship between society and existence. She tweets @funmi796.
Banner: Swimmers — a collage by Robert Frede Kenter
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