Quite Quest // Ridwan Fasasi // Poetry
It is possible
I am on the greener side of my quiet quest.
This lone acacia is pondering about my breath,
Thrown between the blue eyes of the boy holding his country
& the men on the other side holding a gun.
The whole nation is on fire but
I can't call the bird’s silence a dereliction of their duties.
Even I do not want to sing another dirge.
I swear, I do not intend to write another poem
to ask for warmth in a burning contralto.
There must be a place in my body where I do not
believe this country is a dark soil
full of dead flowers. There must be somewhere
in my body where death is nothing but
This bone marrow reaching for an ocean of laughter.
I am losing myself because the contrails
from which the songs of rain spill do not bear the weight of guilt.
Tonight, the national TV will predict the next news
& the newscaster forgets
There's a war brimming overhead.
Father will pretend this country is still sane.
The next morning, mother will place a little luck on miracle
& hope it's enough to save our little lonely life.
You see, the miracle is heavy a burden
& we have loved this country enough. The love,
verdant enough to know that the body
is only a body without the hand of the dead reaching it…
If not anything, let it love us without requesting our life.
Let its love be verdant enough to be reminded that
It was never meant to be built out of graveyards.
The flag is set for burning—
Let it be the cloth & not our patriotism that burns with it.
Ridwan Fasasi, SWAN I, is the winner of the 2024 Labari Prize for Poetry. He is a Nigeria poet of Yoruba Descent. A Pushcart Prize Nominee whose works have appeared on ANMLY Lit, Chestnut Review, Frontier Poetry, Euonia Review, Akpata, Lucent Dreaming, Strange Horizon, Hindsight creative, among others. His works have also been shortlisted for the SprinNg Annual Poetry Contest, Splendor of Dawn Poetry Contest, SOBAF Poetry Slam, and also longlisted for the 2024 Akachi Prize for Literature. Find him on twitter (sorry X) @Ibn_Yushau44.