This month we offer algae on walls, wilted flowers in the sea.
In November we stay with:
exile
Submission guidelines can be found here.
love,
billy lezra
Editor-in-Chief
When Your Mother Is a Bird Who Accompanied Love Into Exile
“Exile is the dying voice of a wounded angel”
— Romeo Oriogun
Some road leads to regret. & your mother is a portrait
of this expression, the terror of teeth gnashing. She sought,
accompanied love into exile, & abandoned you & your brother
to live like the lonely life of orphans, to scrub the algae
on your own walls. She bloomed, & blossomed in the land
of another man. Say, to go into exile is to disappear inside
a mist. On cold nights, when there was no mother to undo
your shivers with warm blankets & heated water,
you undid a crescendo of litanies like a wounded angel
seeking the dawn of a motherly coexistence—but your liturgies
were smoke blowing into exile. & on days when boys your age
ran into their mother’s room to unearth the grievance of their
bellies, you ran into the emptiness your mother left behind
before she dived into disappearance. To unspool a compendium
of hunger from the edge of your lips, you winded through
storm-heavy with insomnia. You were the mirror reflecting
the turbulence of your own—& brother’s body &
you chased the chandelier of your life until you thawed
& poured into oblivion— without unfolding the evening
of your life into beautiful photographs. Loss is a door
to many types of regrets, your mother sits at apex of the first build.
Abdulkareem Abdulkareem, Frontier III, is a Nigerian writer and Linguist. He is a fellow of the SprinNG Writing Fellowship, He won the University of Ilorin SU Writers Competition (Poetry Category) 2022. He won the first runner-up of the World Voices Contest. He was also on the shortlist for the Vallum Poetry Award, 2022, top entries of the Nigerian Students Poetry Prize, 2021. His works have been published on POETRY, Nat Brut, Rough Cut Press, Claw and Blossom, West Trade Review, Off Topic Publishing, Orion’s Belt, Aster Lit, The Shore, Afro Literary Magazine, Brittle Paper, Kissing Dynamite, Poetry Column-NND, Rulerless Magazine, Better Than Starbucks, & elsewhere. He reads poetry for Frontier Poetry & Agbowó.
Twitter: @panini500bc
Instagram: @panini_500bc
the wolves and their soundless howls
they throw wilted flowers
into the sea
fallen petals adorning
the surface like constellations
no matter how hard
i wish upon the stars
i can’t make dead flowers thirst
i’m sorry for your loss
my condolences
platitudes wrapped in a shiny bow
gifted to a heart
ripped from its home
i toss them into a pile of waste
destined for a landfill
silence is lighter to carry
than the noises they make
to make silence feel unwelcome
but i reap what i sow
for when they bellowed at the sky
crushed under their agony
the only solace i could offer
to the shadow
of who they used to be was
i’m so sorry for your loss
Jennifer Nguyễn is a Vietnamese Canadian writer who enjoys exploring the melancholy of life–despite her penchant for joking around too much at times–while sprinkling her stories with a dash of hopefulness. Creative writing is her first love, but she’s spent most of her professional career copywriting for businesses. While she’ll continue on this career path, she’s thrilled to be honing her craft in writing poetry, creative nonfiction and fiction. Her poem Cotton Candy is awaiting publication in Ricepaper Magazine. She enjoys sunny days, the taste of seafood, perfecting her Muay Thai roundhouse kick and a good party. Website: www.jennifernguyen.me
This month we offer algae on walls, wilted flowers in the sea.
In November we stay with:
exile
Submission guidelines can be found here.
love,
billy lezra
Editor-in-Chief
When Your Mother Is a Bird Who Accompanied Love Into Exile
“Exile is the dying voice of a wounded angel”
— Romeo Oriogun
Some road leads to regret. & your mother is a portrait
of this expression, the terror of teeth gnashing. She sought,
accompanied love into exile, & abandoned you & your brother
to live like the lonely life of orphans, to scrub the algae
on your own walls. She bloomed, & blossomed in the land
of another man. Say, to go into exile is to disappear inside
a mist. On cold nights, when there was no mother to undo
your shivers with warm blankets & heated water,
you undid a crescendo of litanies like a wounded angel
seeking the dawn of a motherly coexistence—but your liturgies
were smoke blowing into exile. & on days when boys your age
ran into their mother’s room to unearth the grievance of their
bellies, you ran into the emptiness your mother left behind
before she dived into disappearance. To unspool a compendium
of hunger from the edge of your lips, you winded through
storm-heavy with insomnia. You were the mirror reflecting
the turbulence of your own—& brother’s body &
you chased the chandelier of your life until you thawed
& poured into oblivion— without unfolding the evening
of your life into beautiful photographs. Loss is a door
to many types of regrets, your mother sits at apex of the first build.
Abdulkareem Abdulkareem, Frontier III, is a Nigerian writer and Linguist. He is a fellow of the SprinNG Writing Fellowship, He won the University of Ilorin SU Writers Competition (Poetry Category) 2022. He won the first runner-up of the World Voices Contest. He was also on the shortlist for the Vallum Poetry Award, 2022, top entries of the Nigerian Students Poetry Prize, 2021. His works have been published on POETRY, Nat Brut, Rough Cut Press, Claw and Blossom, West Trade Review, Off Topic Publishing, Orion’s Belt, Aster Lit, The Shore, Afro Literary Magazine, Brittle Paper, Kissing Dynamite, Poetry Column-NND, Rulerless Magazine, Better Than Starbucks, & elsewhere. He reads poetry for Frontier Poetry & Agbowó.
Twitter: @panini500bc
Instagram: @panini_500bc
the wolves and their soundless howls
they throw wilted flowers
into the sea
fallen petals adorning
the surface like constellations
no matter how hard
i wish upon the stars
i can’t make dead flowers thirst
i’m sorry for your loss
my condolences
platitudes wrapped in a shiny bow
gifted to a heart
ripped from its home
i toss them into a pile of waste
destined for a landfill
silence is lighter to carry
than the noises they make
to make silence feel unwelcome
but i reap what i sow
for when they bellowed at the sky
crushed under their agony
the only solace i could offer
to the shadow
of who they used to be was
i’m so sorry for your loss
Jennifer Nguyễn is a Vietnamese Canadian writer who enjoys exploring the melancholy of life–despite her penchant for joking around too much at times–while sprinkling her stories with a dash of hopefulness. Creative writing is her first love, but she’s spent most of her professional career copywriting for businesses. While she’ll continue on this career path, she’s thrilled to be honing her craft in writing poetry, creative nonfiction and fiction. Her poem Cotton Candy is awaiting publication in Ricepaper Magazine. She enjoys sunny days, the taste of seafood, perfecting her Muay Thai roundhouse kick and a good party. Website: www.jennifernguyen.me
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