Wild Dream

For the man who loved— the soft clumped earth
in the moss' net of tightened tender roots, 
the green carpet sod underfoot, 
the dew & wet brown leaves falling together 
on this bed, here & there, here & now, 
& now the trees, & now the wind flinging wings 
wide to open, coming & splintering 
between his fingers, to beat against his face 
in tandem with the ripples of his veins—  
his eyes widens in recollection of raindrops 
that rose through taproot, through bird beak, 
through the only exhale of the body, 
through & through until a funnel arose, 
a gray, swirling, floral pole, patterned in twirls, 
roughly hewn from rocking breath & wet.
& he witnessed it all in his breast, 
laid awake dreaming of it; how it carnaged, 
madly moved, how it seemed to stare from up high, 
its very loft, as if wanting an answer for pain, 
as if trying to tell him to restrain himself. 
& this man is spent, his days are no longer young, 
his energies dissipated into violin songs, 
wooden now inside & outside, 
a wrinkled tree, hollow at the stoop, 
where the thrush nests & nettles graze, 
where beetles rasp & butterflies veer, 
where wild flowers frolic naked & unashamed, 
as a lethargic stream struggles by 
wild as a dream, as eyes roaming 
beneath eyelids, as wonder paling, fading, 
lets go of his hands & of his heart, 
the last stages of atrophy & then, he is stone, 
carved into the nook of a soft pasture, 
nosed by root, big & small, brown & green. 
Clouds sail away, hemmed with golden threads 
&  distance; a disturbed rumbling, a righteous 
returning, that cold loft
opening itself to swallow 
only to find the man empty, a body out of breath.

When The Moon Went To Sleep

Lowering the wick of the oil lamp 
in the sky— the struggling sea drawn 

by fireflies— the withered voice 
of her breasts crouches in whispered 

urgency of grief & fondles my tongue 
with rough fingers. The ashes 

of the day draw bandages over 
her eyes & the sinew thin earth 

chips the rainy night. The ground & I 
float, & the moon goes to sleep; 

body caught by light. In the flat water 
of the mirror, the calabash of my body 

opens, sacred as any junction
& the curve of her stomach leaves 

a tender wound without language. 
The soggy tissues of dusk flowers 

with dew, the breeze traps 
the circumference of sky & weight 

of clouds. I touch the moon's white 
bone, a bleak candle flame drinking 

shadows & her waist beads sing the call 
to prayer. Come, lover, into the silver 

sparks of my spittle, under couplets 
of rain & poem these wet seasons. 

Olokun has all the water; I have all 
the thirst. I lick the salty seaweed 

& at the door mouth, the softest shape 
of want. Have faith, she says. 

I step into her & drown.

Osahon Oka is a Nigerian, Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominated poet. He is the winner of the Brigitte Poirson Poetry Contest June, 2017 and a winner of the Visual Verse Autumn Writing Prize 2022. His poems have appeared in Libretto Magazine, Neocolonial passage, Icefloe Press and elsewhere.​