The Portrait of My Mother As an Antagonist of Death

Mother said in another world, I wasn’t born.
She said the road ate my father on his way
to a protest that never held in truth, because
he was a fire the wind put off before it could
reach the kindling of Aluta. I still imagine
what would have happened if malaikul mawt
had ridden his body of a soul that day 1,005
days before I came to be. But mother stood
staunch in the face of death as though her
body housed excess souls. She stood akimbo
by the door of his hospital ward so each time
death came visiting, it met the fierceness
of a woman at the door, saying: Not today

Mama

After reading O. A. Alhaytham Adedokun

somedays, i’m only a waning shadow / then i see
my world atop your head / like the crest…