Sixteen Couplets

(for mother)

come celebrate
with me that everyday
something has tried to kill me
and has failed.
-Lucile Clifton

my legs are sentences
running through a page.

i have envisioned the end border
so well, sat my illusion

in its utopia.
i’ve laced my tongue

with wilting leaves,
sang the birds in my body

to sleep, patted my veins
& heart; to beckon rest unto them.

grandma once said,
‘no matter how high ájá rises,

it never forgets its origin.’
but i am no dust,

even if i were,
a car would have bruised me

into its cracked windshield.
i hate how reality

swats me back
into my mother’s arms.

with an aubade on her tongue,
mother knows how to manipulate

the deepest wounds with salty fingers,
just to get hold of pure honey.

she touches me and i become
a field of blooming flowers.

mother’s love
is a hand pulling words

on a page
to its origin.

she makes home
out of my scars.

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* ájá: means dust in Igbo.
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Poem © Ugochukwu Damian Oparah
Image by Mohamed Hassan from Pixabay (modified)