Jannah is a single strand. My father is the complementary prognosticator strand.

By Abdulrazaq Salihu

3’                                                                                                                                                5’
Jannah has seven gates.                                             My father is dead. A dirty cutlass
My people would enter through all.                           Stabbed into his flesh. My father
Jannah is thirsty.                                                         Is dead. Gun to the head, bullet
My people are water. Jannah is shahada.                    To his skull. My father is dead
My people died in sujood. Jannah is a                        I cannot unsee the terror. A flood
Myth. My people are the fate. Jannah                         Cleanses itself with my father’s blood
Is the road, my people are the destinations.               My father is dead. Who did this to me
Jannah is a miracle by the mouth of a                        Father is gone. Gun too soon. Gone.
Wound. My people are casualties.                              The Lokoja sands open and swallow
Jannah is a gun, my people are bullets.                      My father, but he’s only gone when I
Shoot your shot or give the gun,                                Believe. My brother sees Pa in dreams
Jannah is silence. My people                                      I tell him dreams are only dreams until
Are dead. My people are gone.                                   We believe. My father is gone. Jannah
My people are pebbles                                               Is jannah because my father is gone,
The size of light. Jannah                                            Because light left us black,
Is a gift. My people unwrap. Jannah                           Because my father is a blue light
Is touch. My people: shy flowers, fold.                        Full of tenderness. My father is dead
Jannah is poison. My people are milk.                        Jannah is jannah. My father is jannah.
Jannah is black stripe against the skin                       My father is the only door: enter
Of white music. My people are songs.                        Through shahada. Through my father’s
My people are sins. Jannah is forgiveness.                 Delicate skin. Jannah is an RNA strand,
Jannah is jannah because my father died.                  My father is the complement.
Jannah needs my father………………………………………My father needs his people.

Jannah is the gap between my thumb and index.       My people are songs the size of quiet.
5’                                                                                                                                                        3’

Abdulrazaq Salihu, TPC I, is a Nigerian poet and member of the Hilltop Creative Arts Foundation. He won the Splendours of Dawn Poetry Foundation’s poetry contest, BPKW Poetry Contest, Poetry Archive Poetry Contest, Masks Literary Magazine Poetry Award, Nigerian prize for teen authors (poetry), Hilltop Creative Writing Award, and others. He has received fellowships and residencies from IWE Writers Residency, SPRING, and elsewhere. He has work published or forthcoming in Strange Horizons, Unstamatic, Bracken, Poetry Quarterly, Rogue, B’K, Jupiter Review, Black Moon Magazine, Angime, Grub Street, and elsewhere. He tweets @Arazaqsalihu; Instagram, @Abdulrazaq._salihu. He’s the author of Constellations (poetry) and Hiccups (prose).

Photo credit: BBC, under “Fair Use” for commentary.

A note from Writers Resist

Thank you for reading! If you appreciate creative resistance and would like to support it, you can make a small, medium or large donation to Writers Resist from our Give a Sawbuck page.