Thrush Poetry Journal
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Chisom Okafor
​

hymn to the bowstring

“given affliction, the body will find a way;
the body will turn itself to music.”
     ─  Joseph Fasano
 
at times        i like to imagine       that the rains made branches
hang more heavily        so that        some swept the dust       
that would soon become        a burial place for an       offspring of leaves
 
my lover       knows the principles of        death as rationale      
for this        floral survival       phenomenon
wherein a cycle       has to end for another       to commence
 
sometimes i want to admit       to feeling       the weight of the world
stockpiled       in my head       but he calls me hashashin
which means bound        in perpetuity to hashish       which means creed
 
which means bowstring       sworn  to its archer       and to the holy act
of destruction       i say        destroy this body
and before nightfall       I’ll raise it up       which is to say i want
 
this body to love        in the gratifying way        of sideways rain that levitates
with        the monsoon at daybreak       and leaves flower funnels
water-logged and longing        to unfurl at noon again       for another chance at light.




Chisom Okafor is a Nigerian poet and clinical nutritionist. His work have been nominated for the Gerald Kraak Prize and a pushcart prize.  His debut full-length poetry manuscript, Birthing, was a finalist for the 2021 Sillerman First Book Prize for African Poets.




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