Gunpowder
written by: Abiodun Salako
@I_amseawater
It is not that I knew my parents
dedicated me to the God of the unknown
or that jet black can mean hair/
beauty/ dent of a smile bent backwards
but first, it is through you that I knew
the bruise on the back of a
mango doubles as my skin
I never truly learnt the
basis of arithmetic
Until a tongue that fished
in my mouth was subtracted
Until additions can actually mean
not the doubling of something
But of nothing: let’s think of how leaving
and staying can multiply the same thing
Of how emptiness can be added to emptiness:
that is the power of grief
And then, blowing or banging, you ask me,
‘are you gun or gunpowder?’
Abiodun Salako (he/him) is a Nigerian Journalist, Copywriter and Resident- at-Sea. In his spare time, he daydreams of Eden. His fractured pieces have appeared in Kalahari Review, Africanwriter, WriteNowLit, SledgehammerLit, DwartsMag, LocalTrainMag, Levatio, BullshitLit and elsewhere. He writes from Lagos, Nigeria.
