POETRY

Abdulkareem Abdulkareem 

                        CREDIT: MIKE WILLCOX 

  

              

              ECHO                     

Anguish echoes in your stuttering voice,

drowned in drunk, scotch labels you 

— a drunk, drunkard in a pit of loss.

There is no better way to label a man 

as sad—dip in sober. You limp in glory. 

Your wound bleeds with regret, in gush.

You stare into the mirror stained with

egg yolks. You see him, bent double

in the face of death. Your mind wanders

into this ugly memories when he modeled

his braveness for war. Muscles branded 

with his mother's name, your wife. 

How her warm body was buried in the 

coldness of the steel. & your son, too, 

brimmed into an empty bottle of beer. 

You are still learning to look up the sky 

for hope—carrying the neck of a pig. 

Bloodshot. Your eyes, a sky of red contrail. 

You fumbled your chest for joy, & you could 

only grapple an ashtray. It is impossible to unlearn 

grief. This, a revelation for fallen flowers. 

                                                 

Abdulkareem Abdulkareem, Frontier III, is a Nigerian writer and Linguist. His works appear/forthcoming on POETRY, West Trade Review, Off Topic Publishing, Aster Lit, Feral Poetry, Better Than Starbucks, The Shore Poetry, Brittle Paper, Claw and Blossom & elsewhere. He reads poetry for Frontier Poetry & Agbowó Magazine.