I forget

I forget what exactly,

But it’s something in the way it’s always summer.

The nights are always short because

The sun cannot wait to kiss your bare neck at dawn.

I forget what exactly,

But it’s something in the kink of your curls

And in the slight smile on your lips

And the slow curve of your hips.

I forget what exactly,

But it’s something in the way your eyes

Smile at the world,

Some greatness hidden in the brightly gleaming

Mahogany irises; freshly brewed mocha.

I forget what exactly,

But there’s something in the way Light

Softly touches your skin playfully

Dancing along the curve of your back.

Never drowning you in him: not ever.

He contrasts you from the mundane

And says, “look at her”.

I forget what exactly,

But it’s something in the music

Of the way you say the words you speak,

Dispelling the atonal sameness

Of these random sounds we call language.

Music waited on the fringes of reality

For you to be born so he could come

Say hello to your soul. And

You live in his arms, intertwined with him,

Like a braid.

I forget what exactly,

But it’s something in the clothes that you wear

And the way you braid your hair

And the way your black skin is a canvas

For the kaleidoscope of batik patterns

Floating on your head wrap.

I forget what exactly,

It’s something that is within you

It was given in your blood and

Lives in your skin

And demands what little

Breath I have left for life.

Olori-elewa.

"For all the black women I have loved and who have loved me." 

Vincent

Some men are big bellied because they never move. Others because of the dreams they had to eat barehanded so that the ones they love may survive. But men are not binary; they live in the spaces in-between things. He lay closer to having had to eat his dreams barehanded. But he was not a liar; how could he be with his belly in front of him a constant reminder.

He told me he threw an 80 fastball when he was 14. I didn’t know what a fastball was, but I listened because it was cold and I was hungry and I was lonely. He told me he was from New York and that parking was a bitch in the eighties. I told him he’d never seen a bitch like parking in Lagos. We became friends over that laughter. We became brothers when each night I would ride the bus back and forth several times because he too felt lonely at night.

It is quite the trade being a bus driver, moving thankless blobs of humanity back and forth ad infinitum. It is quite the trade being a student, so caught up in the rush of minutia that you forget to be thankful for the men and women who move you back and forth, between minutiae, ad infinitum.

But in the middle of the night, two lonely souls will meet on a bus and become brothers over fastballs and parking and where to take pretty girls on dates for free in Brooklyn. He told me he busted his arm learning to throw curveballs before he should have. He could have gone pro, but weary are those words. Arm in sling he had to eat his dreams. Had to get a job. You know how these things go. He ended up in the south.

He told me he coached baseball when he could get a moment. He told me that he would never teach a young boy to throw a curveball before he turned 16. I still didn’t know what a curveball was. I might find out one day. He died in a car crash. One reckless blob of humanity runs a red light and a brother you made in the middle of the night on bus rides, the memories of which grow hazy, is gone.

You will remember him for the story he told you of when he tried his first cigarette and his father caught him. Or the first time he tasted whiskey and his father caught him. Or the first time… you have started to forget. The minutia grow, it is inevitable that you will forget.

“You alright son? You like you need to talk to someone”