LitPub

I love my country. But America Courts me — the man with everything. I love my country: Dark, Black, Gold Yellow teeth & a hunger for me: My country with its abundant rains That loves us to death. I love my country. But America Is big everywhere: Texas. McDonald’s. Starbucks. America Sephora, Walmart, IKEA, The […]

And in the casket came a tooth, Burden of four pallbearers There is a heavy weight to this tooth Extracted in cruel colonial jest from the jaw Of an assassinated patriot, like priceless coltan From Katanga’s bleeding bowels Belgium’s burden Congo’s catastrophe Sixty years, memento of the King’s colonial guard Now glittering trophy in the […]

We are H-A-P-P-Y We are H-A-P-P-Y We know we are We are sure we are We are H-A-P-P-Y Happppppy! I I come from the country Of the Happiest People on earth, Where death sells at ten for one kobo And the Living envy the peace Of the hastily dispatched. Living every day on the edge […]

They will ask me when I know, I’ll sigh and say not so long ago. It happened in fragments—piece by piece you came and filled up the empty space—and in a matter of time, you became my world. They will be surprised when I say you are the only man I have ever truly loved. […]

I still remember my ball boy training you have to squat with your left leg simultaneously kneel with your right leg perpendicular to your left so even if you miss the catch the ball is halted by your legs at a 90-degree angle I often missed the catch even before my strokes never the athlete […]

Ìyá Àgbà Every ẹsẹ of Odù, every word of ìwúre, every atom of àfọ̀ṣẹ that would make this day had been wept for, sweated over and bled on by Ìyá Àgbà. Patience had never been her thing, she wanted all her things done now! However, each time she found herself growing impatient, and remembered the […]

“We have a lot of insecurity in Nigeria. By road we are not safe. By train we are not safe”. (From a survivor of the Abuja-Kaduna Train bomb; Mon., March 28, 2022) Too many ills do a nation kill Ills just as many as the corpses That clutter every gutter Of our callously mis-governed country […]

Translated by Ibrahim Fawzy It seems to him that he deserves the Nobel Prize for Laziness. He sees his head assassinated by idleness, digging swirls of silence in his blood in a similar way to digging gas lines in the street where he lives.  His everyday dreams gather like insects, haunting his body in successive […]

Mashood Ọlábísí Àjàlá’s wild ride of a life began on a bicycle. In 1952, the Nigerian writer, then 22 years old, biked for 2,280 miles from Chicago to Los Angeles; his 28-day journey was featured in newspaper reports, attracting the notice of many notables. That July, Àjàlá, described in newspaper reports as “personable,” lectured at […]

PERSONS CHIEF GUARD 1 GUARD 2 VINCENT ADAMMA BAYODE CATHERINES ABASIAKARA IDARA BELLO LEILA EXTRA TRANSGRESSOR _____________________________________________ Afternoon in a hall. A middle-aged woman, CHIEF, sits at a table on the podium, going through papers. A door opens and two female guards herd five men in handcuffs into the hall and make them stand in […]