there are landmines in Lagos

it’s 05:30 and Eko misted
periwinkle blue with excess dawn,
already grovels ahead — stretching
out into a steamy mirage

cars shift like clouds, conversing
in honks and angry pointers
sudden like lightning flash;
mufflers puff —
continuous incense to God:
a prayer for a thousand reasons
not to die en-route Golgotha

who doesn’t carve a new home
on the sprawling asphalt?
i find love again, but in Lacasera;
and shrink in pity at a crippled raconteur
trying to sell his music album

Lagos goes slow at night
like a python that’s eaten too much.
the madness loosens at 11th hour
you cannot beat time in Lagos

this home is not unbroken.
she hums of government betrayal:
deadly potholes
like landmines on a battlefield;
and when our Danfo is done
escaping the clogged thoroughfare,
a belle buried in her job-hunt
documents screamed
how did that Micra beat you?
to the rebuke of a septuagenarian:
son of man, home is running nowhere.

Eko - (Lagos) A busy city in Western Nigeria.

Lacasera – a beverage popularly hawked on streets in traffic situations.

Danfo – a popular Lagos commercial bus.

Micra – a small commercial model of Nissan Vehicles.

O-Jeremiah Agbaakin