The Metaphor Of How
We Metamorphosed Our Home With Prayers
written by: Abubakar Auwal
this night/ i’m a boy in the midstream// of your voice/ & the metaphor between/ the pebbles & the gag of your teeth// carved in the reptiles of supplications.// i’m sorry. what again?— fire and water are// bodies buried in my voice./ when I first voiced God my longest Du’a/ he was drunk in my ink;/ my hands cupped and held out to his throat.// in deep reconcile; my uncle appeared in hurled images.// I remember mother once said;/ uncle swallowed the whole city/ that rode to the ears of God.// yet uncle is homed between/ the bone-thud of his prayer/ & the flight feathers of death,// somewhere in the shrine of memories/ As-Alull’azeem has been/ the popular prayer chained on the wheels// that sprocket my father’s bicycle to rail.// how I wish my father’s supplication is a country sketched in peace/ how I wish we don’t only mouth breathless prayers/ we breathe our hearts too/ how I wish, I home a cottage in my uncle’s prayer.// but this night I’ve come to see God// with my poetry knocking on his door.
- The Metaphor Of How We Metamorphosed Our Home With Prayers - September 14, 2023
