DSC carries too much of this memory.
It is as if I wade through the weight of water
& then/there/a memory made flesh—a secondary school mate/
older now/more flesh around the waist/ less laughter around the lips/
a child by his side
then i realise how far I have travelled
& how I have never really left.
Sometimes/at the Police post/I feel the weight of all the years
press down/the silence of the alarm/the grass near the rust gate/
the guava tree that died/the yellowing skin of houses
with blacked out windows like old teeth
& I want to return back/a boomerang into the withered arms of
yesterday/into those brief moments that felt like forever.
Sometimes/I feel DSC like a wounded beast yowling to me/
I stretch my hands towards it
& like the echo of a long ago war/it recedes into that place of
forgetting/I spool my hands back from that ravine
& it holds nothing.
*DSC is an acronym for Delta Steel Company that was owned by the Nigerian federal government.
Osahon Oka writes from Warri, Delta State, Nigeria. He holds a degree in English and Literary Studies. He enjoys experimenting with new forms and styles. His works appear in anthologies as well as literary spaces like Ghost Heart Lit, Lit Quarterly, Icefloe Press, LItbreak Magazine, Jalada Africa, Lucky Jefferson and elsewhere. He serves as the lead correspondent at Praxis Magazine and his debut, a collection of short stories, is forthcoming on Praxis books.
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