CW: Loss, grief, self harm
After Rock me, Mercy– Yusef Komunyakaa
We stand on our toes
twirling to the sounds
of the waves. The river
stones are watching. A crab
crawled past us watching us
sing. Guardian angels, do not
remind us what it feels like to
be grief-stricken. We do not
want to ferry grief with a paper
boat. We sutured the opening
in our body caused by grief.
And when grief tries to enter
again, we’ll brittle the tower
of its body into swabs, into
shards. Our body, a sacrament
& we stamp on grief, our
legs worn inside a shoe
with graphene soles
as we crush this
grief with a
dance.
Abdulkareem Abdulkareem (he/him) is a Nigerian writer, linguist, he studies Linguistics at the University of Ilorin, Ilorin, Nigeria. His works have appeared/forthcoming on ARTmosterrific, Kalahari Review, Shallow Tales Review, Nnoko stories, Nanty greens, Ice Floe, Rigorous, Second Chance lit, Olney magazine, Ninshar.art, window facing windows review elsewhere. He tweets @panini500bc