Muheez Olawale
Muheez Olawale writes poetry and prose from Lagos, Nigeria. His poem won the Chief of Army Staff Literary Competition 2024. He has works published or forthcoming in Brittle Paper, The Hooghly, Everscribe, The Flare, The Kalahari, Afrocritik, and elsewhere. He tweets and grams @_muheezolawale.
Easy read of the poems in the images above:
Monkey no Fine
mother paints my pains into a rainbow
& everything that rises at the end of the
storm to reach for light.
beauty, she says, sometimes blinds the
beholder, sometimes isn't the crystalline
smiles i seek, sometimes lies in the depths
of a chasm in a planet i've forgotten. so
she picks a honeycomb, and rakes out the
laments that have crept into the crevices of
my tastebud. maami, i know what hunger
tastes like — kneeling at the foot of the
bed and clutching the earth, praying that i
do not get thrown off in its ceaseless spin.
there's a galaxy of dying stars orbiting
inside of me. on days like this, hurt lunges
like asteroids, hitting and eating up my
dreams. so maami holds me steady as i sail
through nightmarish paths, and she burns
herself to be the sun that radiates my life.
even if this universe says no, there is
another in Me, seeking wormholes to light.
because I am more than you see, even
the x-ray can not capture the beauty
rippling inside of me. but maami knows.
she's the one who wrenched the litanies
out of my tongue, and layers the
panegyrics in hues of a promised tomorrow.
monkey no fine, but im mama like am.
Stars Don't Die
what a way to abandon this craze behind!
leave earth with fire trailing your tail as you
join the league of stars gliding down the Milky
Way. home is not home if it thorns the heart.
a dying star attracts none until it plummets down
the sky in flames. then they crown it a shooting
star. #RIP to a legend whose muffled screams
crashed six feet deep into the earth with him.
but you never liked the idea of martyrs. now,
you float atop meteoric showers, waving goodbye
to the constant fleeing from murderous asteroids.
mama drops yet another one on the morning you
flee. she sutures papa's sins into you and visits
upon them in your heart. an errant pencil has the
eraser to wipe its oversteps. life has none. nine
years and more days to stand before the mirror,
shoulders sagging from bearing the weight of
papa's sins. they say beautiful things have ugly
origins. perhaps, you are the most beautiful, an
epitome of the word-failing pains that shackled
your mother back in that alley and forced you into
her. you fear, one day, time shall heal mama's
scars, and you shall vanish. but there's always
hope yonder, so you claw at this poem as a
spaceship, to explore realms your
trickling tears traverse not.
Everything Sweet and Tender
why be the foil of your own hero,
giving out what you have not?
if life is a play, then curtains drop
right at the onset.
but darkness is engraved on your tongue already,
and you breath nothing but lonely nights. perhaps,
this poem is the light you need. of what use
is love that flees your cold heart to warm others?
even when sprawled in the chasm of melancholy,
rip the lingua of brokenness off your soles and
stand tall. even wilting bones enjoy the sweet
fragrance of flowers. blurred yesteryears swig
freshest tears. why seek miracles when you are
an embodiment of a plethora? walk the seas
without drowning and let the running tides soften
your calloused heart into a marshmallow.
why practice smiling before the mirror when the
sun awaits outside? the first step to being happy is
to plant love in your heart. it blooms, pollen grains
flies. you shall be a walking garden, an abode for
lilies and butterflies and everything
sweet and tender.
