Requiem

In the wild of the sea, we lie gathered in the poem,

Browned, paddling softly across Bethel.

God bless the colony of birds nestled

In your fingers.

Your hands, shaky, plunged in

The two ends of the accordion, glorious as flora.

Wistful reeds. Soft music, fluid as sin.

Dacious Kasoka is an economist, poet, and machine learning engineer. A 2023 Best of the Net nominee, his poems have been published and are forthcoming in World Voices Magazine, Writers Space Africa Magazine, The Shallow Tales Review, and elsewhere. When he’s not writing, he’s deeply immersed in reading or coding.