Ise Owo

And so this is us reverting back to us,
like Abiku we're reborn,
Grammars have failed to fill the pots in our bellies,
Degrees have left us undignified,
with strange words wedded to our pedigrees, forenames circumcised.
So we're back in the future with the past in our backpacks
We've read our palms in the sight of the moon,
Told our parents of its prophesies.

So now we rise to pick pieces of dreams,
Trying stitching it all to a piece.
We roll the wheels with believing feet, tirelessly to sow dreams into outfits,
No longer tailored to specifics, we're tailors sewing ourselves in fabrics.

We've been handed needles to prick away fears,
make ourselves stand tall with names,
And so each evening, we no longer speak to the sun nor allow its lingering affections on our skins,
but like warriors, with balanced scissors,
we pierce through thickness.

We dream on the edges of a scissors, fly on the axis of a needle,
tread on flimsy threads,
stitch the needed, make allowances for the unexpected.
We're back to trace the lines on our palms,
Tread their faintness into sureness.
Now we speak of what comes to heart, not words taken from the tongue of the dead.
We speak the lines on our palms, words unrehearsed.

Peace.

Cold Crown