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in a dream i don’t tell anyone about

two boys my age are on their way home from madrasah

one picks up a hundred naira note by the roadside

& suddenly becomes the texture of the wind

 

breaking news

at the cemetery some buried corpses are missing again       

lost     if found please return to the nearest lichyard

 

you ask why i write verses about grief & missing people

don’t you understand   tomorrow you/i may be the next

person plucked from the face of the earth          lost

& never to be found again

 

my uncle walks around with amulets tied to his waist

at night his wife recites ayyatul kurisiyyu from the Qur’an

& teaches the children how to say

bismillah tawakkalti ‘alal-laah …

before leaving the house every morning

 

i too understand the sacrament     in which we beseech Allah

to be our sanctuary

& protect us from the hands that keep snatching

snatching souls away from our bodies

 

teach me how to survive the night        teach me

how to weather the day in a country where every road

seems to lead to the waiting mouth of death



Sodïq Oyèkànmí is a genre-bending writer of Yorùbá descent. He is a florist, librarian, and thespian. A Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominee, his works have been published/ forthcoming in Poetry Wales, The Muse Journal, trampset, The Orchards Poetry Journal, Olney Magazine, and Agbowó. He tweets @sodiqoyekan.
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18 Mar 2024

Strange Horizons
We are very happy to welcome Dante Luiz as a new fiction editor on the team! Dante is a Ignyte Award winning author, and has been with Strange Horizons working as an Art Director for the past several years. We’re stoked to bring him on to the fiction side and have him bring his wonderful insight and skill to the fiction team.
Day in and day out, the rough waters of the Pacific slam themselves against the protrusion of sandstone the locals refer to as Morro Rock. White streaks of bird shit bleed down the rock, a testament to the rare birds of prey that nest in its pocked face overlooking the bay.
in my defence, juggling biological and artificial, i tripped over my shoelace, and spilled my lungs empty of the innocence that was, before guilt.
the birds, / who carry with them / the many names of the dead
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