V

forgive me, but my favourite misdeed is despair/

& i do not know how to unfold/ an origami of supplications/

out of my mouth/ that they may flap their seraph’s wings/

& aeroplane / into the ethereal coliseum

IV

every night/ anxiety necklines my head /like a noose/

& there are days / where an exhale is a garrotted creature/

by which i mean/ breath has nine lives/ & like a cat/

my whetting worries /drown them all

III

today/ my mother / triangles /my palms into an adhan/

little does she know/ her son is a cataleptic polygon/

fleeing from the crippled squat of an orison

II

& my purged face /washed of the wild desires of hope/

wears the hides of a moony gloom/ that it may feed/

on every hard pill of the cathedral’s light

I

at the altar call/my lips falter like a broken rib/

& i hold the threshold/of a non-existent precipice/

perhaps/ life is a topless pit/ & we

are still falling/from the illusion of a false heaven

---

Adesiyan Oluwapelumi, TPC XI, is an African poet and a naturalist whose writing particularly presents a social commentary on the intersectionality between memory, identity, religion and selfhood. He was the winner of the 2022 Cheshire White Ribbon Day Creative Competition and a finalist in the 2022 WeNaija Literary Contest. Some of his poems are published/forthcoming in Poetry Wales, Tab Journal, IHRAF Publishes, Rogue Agent and elsewhere. He reads poetry for The Five South and The Kitchen Table Quarterly. Find him on Twitter @ademindpoems and on Instagram @ademind17.