Love Askew.

He shifted in his seat, cleared his throat and fiddled with the collar of his shirt. He was smiling when her eyes travelled the distance from the prawn sauce on her plate to his face.

“I have something to tell you, something important,” He wiggled his shoulders a little, his smile even wider.

“I think I have fallen in love with you.”

“Whatever for?” she sputtered.

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Seeds of kindness.

My parents never bought sweets for us when we were little children or even now. If you found us with a sweet in our fingers or mouth, it was definitely bought by one of our very many uncles and aunties.

Found And Lost.

I miss your name between my lips,
The lilt of it when I am happy,
The rumble when I am angry
The thin whisper when the world sits on me.

Finding the Dream

 

Laying dreams on the table,
Spreading them out to shine or sparkle.
Drawing patterns with bare feet on the sands of paradise
With my mother’s voice in my head,
To tie me to shore despite the calls of the sea.
Carrying the weight of joy and freedom,
Singing as I shed the coil of twos
Dancing as I wear the sheen of threes
Wallet folds its arms
And laughs with twisted mouth
I shut my eyes and tend fragile hopes
And continue to believe
There’s something missing in these pictures.
Me.

Saint John one of the Virgin Islands inconstituent district of the United States Virgin Islands (USVI), an unincorporated territory of the United States. The smallest of the main US islands besides Water Island, Saint John is located about four miles east of Saint Thomas, the location of the territorys capital, Charlotte Amalie.

Adieu Gentle Giant

When I was a child, I thought love was a Don Williams song.

I didn’t find it in the songs of Lionel Richie- who I adored and thought I would marry when I was old enough, more than Kenny Rogers who sang songs that twisted my little heart, more than all the other singers whose music gave my childhood shimmering colour.

A Knotty Affair-2

He had his bath with the scented soap his sister bought for him, he was suddenly grateful for her insistence on his taking the soap even though he said it wasn’t manly to smell like a flower. With his towel slung around his neck and his green and black boxers riding on his narrow waist, he hurried to his room to change into the clothes he had picked out the previous day.

“Guy this one wey you dey spray perfume for this kind hot afternoon, you don arrange babe?” Osaro, his roommate asked from his bed across the room.

“This one fit arrange babe? He dey spray the thing for him books them. Last, last na book he go marry.” John said from his perch on the top bunk.

A Knotty Affair.

He wanted to ask where she had gotten the gun from, it was easier to be practical than to try to unravel the knots, tangles and mazes that brought them to the point where his wife calmly- even casually, promised to stain the wall behind his head with his blood and pieces of his brain.

“Ehi…” he began.

“Ehi calm down? Ehi be rational? Isn’t that what you are going to say?” each word hitting him with the force of bullets.