Adedayo Agarau

concerning us

i tell you to imagine / our home / think of it golden & perfect / the

curtains falling against the sultry nude outside / you tell me to ebb the

distance & mock the shadows / on  the wall of the house we imagine

together / later i would be inside the ship of my own making / later i

would be collecting maps from the dunes of smoke / there are things

my body would like to say concerning the mouth / i had a kiss once

/ it was dark & long & there was music / in the place where light poured

into us / i tell you to take my tongue out of the water & mop it / in

the end there was so little you could do with your own ambition / in

one of my dreams there was a fisherman gathering his net / his

silhouette a distracted hue / going home / i wonder what he will find

when he arrives / once there was home in the space between us / now,

tell me what to think

the women you’ve loved

i.

in place of a shawl, she spoons you—gratitude missives your heart—no one has loved me this way, you confess in

the neon light leaking from the lamppost outside.

              she kisses your neck—as if undoing every lover, her wetness licks clean the sore in your lips.

i want you to stay—she says.

              you know the night is coming & the dreams will chase you out of the places of desire & you will

wake up not wanting the softness of her palm, or her round face, the way it curves to form a smile.

ii.

in that dream, you were miles away, but when you spotted her, she was in the market with a group of mothers

—they were singing intelligibly

              you were puzzled by the language, so you run toward them—

when you arrived, the market had become desolate. only the dust of bones remained. only the shadows of stalls.

              you call her name; instead, the echoes of the song you heard swallow you in the empty market.

in that dream, you went blind, or a cloak of darkness fell over you.

              you struggled with prayer as if a nest was built in your throat.

when you woke up, the one lying beside you was still sleeping.

iii.

you leaf her nipples with your tongue—

lobe her ear, & fondle her breast—

it’s been three months since you last saw
             
& you’ve had dreams you wanted to bowl into her ears

she reaches for your arm, cups your face in her palms

says, i love you so much, you nod

& go in gently

her moans fall off like leaves in harmattan

she gathers you into her chest & fucks you back

loneliness cannot be undone in a moment

but you reach inside her as if the longing can be fetched

iv.

you finally tell her of the other dream:

a howling boy shaves his head in a forest

& a dead lamb’s intestine alfresco by a drying lake

she says it’s meaningless.

v.

outside by the patio,

a woman teaches her son to ride a red bike.

maa’mi, mo miss yin gidi gan

a broken mirror, a dead cat

cauliflower in a green handbag

an old pen, a gratitude journal

your expired frames, akwaeke’s dear senthuran

the static radio in the background gains clarity

I forget where we were by Ben Howard begins to play

vi.

in an old tale, a baby elephant left home

& never found its mother

your lover arrives from work & kisses you

vii.

of all the things you will miss

it’s the silence after sex that’ll wreck you the most