POETRY
By Yemi Soneye
Sunday, March 20, 2011.
The African Emperor
His friend’s palace was
hurled down by bare peasants
The emperor,
being a thoughtful man
and not a friend in need,
decided to let his
people do the math
He went to them
with ribboned black boxes
in which lain skeletons
of three decades’ treasures
But hardly had his helicopter
wailed over the great walls
than the iron gates banged
And till smuggled out by sworn pages,
in the servants’ slums he hid
Schoolgirl Lola
(for Lola Shoneyin, with Love)
Schoolgirl Lola
disturbs the class
luckily, she sat on an egg
And ran to hide
by a river
but a bird made her sing
They breathed crisp
wished
their priggishness
did not tuck her away
For she came
changed, loving
flying and smiling
but as a witch on them
The Things I Never Say
The things I
never say but ought to
never excavate like
aged phlegm nor go
sleep from brow
They stay rocks in throat
mares on morn
tearing for transit
when path closed
But why? why do me
like that when it is they
that swirl into hourglass
to stay safe till moment
passed?
Yemi Soneye was born in 1991. He is a graduate of Agricultural Economics and Extension from Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, Ogbomoso, Nigeria. His works have appeared on Sentinel Nigeria, Saraba magazine, Istanbul Literary Review and Palapala magazine. He was a winner in the 2010 StoryTime One Sentence Short Story Competition.