Two Poems by David Solomon, Two Images by Josie Vie

Memory as a mirror for grief

Blue smoke lingers beneath a spilled pot
      of rice. in the distance a house is holding it’s ash with both hands; offering a resurrection
                                 prayer.

Yesterday my brother’s small feet danced and
      danced, and mimicked a leaf floating
in the music of wind.        His cackles
       excavating laughters that seasoned mother’s
                                cooking.

We watched God wink his many eyes like
       fireflies, (maybe it wasn’t a wink) while my brother, pointing to the stars mumbled
      something about a sparkly dress for mother
                                 to wear.

I remember mother’s mouth opening, almost
       disuniting. her jugular tightening like tendons behind the thumb, brother sinking into
       her chest like wish fountain coins, as a bullet
digs through them like an arrow digging
                                 through an obstacle.

I remember my father’s chest drummed into
       an exit song inscribed in my lungs.
You see, I have been made into the song of
       vultures; a testimony of elegies and a
                                 mirror for grief.

As I return here, beside the spilled pot, Ade’s
       footprints are sprinkled with particles of ash. Look how my mother still holds him in
                                 transience.

I remember him frolicking, carrying death
                                 as subtle
                                      as
                                        a
                                 heartbeat.

Amina

I hold your name inside my mouth
& consider all that is buried

in the esurience of sea—everything
demanded by fate.

What is distance, if not the cold palms
of death

s t r e t c h e d between
our chests?

You have journeyed in the skin
of my poems like a recurring

ache I am unwilling to treat. Last
week at the beach, a boy

threw a stone in the sea & I imagined
you in his fisted hand.

in the open slices of silence, I reach
into memory, palms spread,

fetching you from everything except
myself.

But in this version of poem, I am standing
on the edge of your face

as a smile. I am the ground, unbolting.
I am whatever opens the fists

& plucks the stone; I am the voice of Jesus
& you, you are Lazarus.

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David Solomon is a Human Anatomy student of the University of Maiduguri and a young ever learning writer. You can find him on Twitter: @Davidso12673615.

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