About a week ago, my grandma turned 85. I remember I was so fond of her growing up. I would sit around her all day during long vacation and sleep in her room which she kept specially for me when my siblings and I visited. Mama in Oyo — as…

A large ball, of dreams and memories, A vicious cycle of profanities. Needle and Wine cups, Dirtied eyes and punctured veins, An unholy communion with the Most High A wall of glass, Fragile, bland, uninteresting, A bowl of radish without its seasoning. Sometimes even the edges of your life lose sharpness, And at the end it dawns, That in that journey to find yourself, You might have as well lost yourself.

I was nobly born where ‘ẹdun’ thrives. Before I die, I must print my soul on paper My bones, sturdy like Òyìnbó’s giant huts and his paper cowries As I slave daily towards freedom My soul, the color of words words, the blue of deep seas A nubile blu jay providing nuts for his…

Life is to be taken fists clenched & unyielding and sleep is for the wicked I sweat at work & in bed So I succeed or think I do when I see in cyan & purple Yet, earth is sometimes brown devoid of grass, love & sound Then, life is to be given hands feeble & freely open Lots run through empty earths Fill this void & save my heart

59! Fifty-nine years ago, after a strategically prolonged transition period, our friend — the British Government relinquished her power over Nigeria and the country was declared independent. Sir. …

How does it feel to be a big fool? How does the humor hit? How do you pay for an extra bottle Knowing your kids starve? How do you snore After beating your woman to a pulp? How haven’t you choked on your diet? How haven’t you died yet? How…

Intruding raindrops make noises over our room beclouding our moans. — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — Check out other new Haiku on the BetterthanStarbucks poetry magazine — May 2019 edition.

SINGLE Too many a time Butterflies drunken Stagger in my stomach As pairs softly snog. In my pant the other day I found a frigging salmon A raging one! All who got away return To dampen my dreams. All the time I want to talk I wish someone would Hold my hand With me dance the kipples The dance of carnal passion But I’m by myself. It takes two to tango. It takes two to tangle. © Kayode Afolabi 2016 First published online by Kalahari Review

I wonder if you ever think of me, if I’m on your mind the way you stay night and day in mine when the cabman bangs me in a pothole, I remember when you drove down the third hook of my brassier, let go of the jugs whispering the warmth of your hugs. I burnt your portrait the night you left but from there where it was, you still leer, you still snigger so loudly when I lace my shoes and when I place orders in twos