SYNCOPE & OTHER POEMS

 By Zainab Kuyizhi

                        Image by Edith Brown

SOMETHING HAPPENED AT MY TAILOR'S: SYNCOPE

(6th feb, 2022)

Creak, creak, creak…

      Having seen better days

  

           The wooden stool I’d sat on  

        groaned. It goes creak, creak,

creak, at every move my butt makes

tired; I got up; my head

              is spun around 

            as though in space. Noises 

       start to fade out. Google said

  my brain probably isn’t getting 

enough oxygen 

          

           5, 10, 15 seconds & with

       startling clarity, I slumped 

beyond despair and dread

           & was taken 

into

                 the undreamt

                        glaring dullness 

                   I came from.

  

  Zainab, Zainab

            Zainab

            

 My tailor must be terrified 

           by the way it took me

What got you?

      Have you been thinking?

                     I don’t know 

      

   Did it ever happen to you too?

                                                                                 

                   Photo Credit: Google

 I TELL  YOU THIS, MEN ARE SCUM!

In the screenshots she sent of them  

exchanging sweet nothings, my friend made it clear 

that she didn’t want her hopes crushed like before.

Whenever my lover texts back fast or comes to see me after work;

hands pressed against her chest, she’d cry, even watch us

the way hungry dogs watch their owners, 

hoping food or warmth of some sort would reach them.

She heard me ask an old lady

 about the men in her time. 

Specifically whether they too 

had left her heart twisting in the wind

Child, they woo us with honeyed tones

 & leave us unsatisfied, 

guilt-ridden & 10 pounds heavier 

There must be something

 telling these men 

to crush us

 until our bones are dust 

and our names, forgotten.

                                                                                  

                   Photo Credit: Netnaija

A HOME ISN’T WHERE THE HEART IS

We were told over and over

To call these walls & floors & curtains 

& windows & a poem full of rooms

& an opened arm & a familiar noise 

& blazing lights &

A mother’s loving arms & a father’s loured face

A home;

Where the heart safely resides 

Where you feel alive 

& your happiness thrive 

But a home isn’t where the heart is

Neither is it behind these curtains & 

walls

nor is it above these floors 

Home is wherever we went.

                                                                                  

Zainab Kuyizhi is a young Nigerian poet and a spoken word artist. Her work explores the dynamics of life and its entirety, especially, love, pain, and anger. She's on Twitter & Instagram @yar_kuyizhi.