Teen Lit Journal

Arrow Of Poached Porcupine—Abubakar Auwal Smiles before the stream of earth— blood coloring the grasses. Sounds of ceremonial drums;  Race of stray bullets.  A child is dazzled and his mother has learnt to fly; Men over here wear spears between their teeth. Take a look into the eyes of the town.  There are clouds wearing the face of gods, Holding swords and false promises. "Oh,where else does a boy learn to scream?"  The cries of a missing mother  Who lost her seed  In a barren farm, speak! Since yesteryears till date- the red blood flows beyond the eyes Cracking with tears Till it becomes dregs.  In restlessness we swim, Out of the home for dome, To escape from  The direction of stray bullets.  No skin is left unscarred , Fathers and potential mothers,   brothers and sisters  Worship in the death field.  They prick our daughters Into early mothers They "inactive" our brothers and sisters; And we found them asleep in the d...

It Is Well—Arikewusola Abdul-Awal At night, when the earth dresses in the cassock of darkness// I supine on the thatched mat, spying the rain beaten rafters// I lay my head on the interlocked fingers, cerebrating on ‘what next?’  Memories of the past trickle down my veins// Dragging me to the dreary days of failures, of rejections & of mistakes// Those memories wage wars on my tender heart// Boom! My heart is bombed & I become a lethargic soul in front of fate.  I ogle the secluded angle in my room// I envisage my present; Sitting with its raised knees–arms are folded round them// Like a bony-ribbed beggar, begging for a better bundle in his bowl.  The other angle displays a blurred foreshadowing of my life’s drama. I crane// But my future is a strand of black hair in the gathering of grays// I blink, blink, blink and blink until my gravid eyes give birth to brines. My heart is an overpowered empire// Future of hopes, in fear and dangers// & I am a tethered bu...

The Tale Of A Globetrotter Once upon a time, a traveller comes to our village from a black world behind the sea, wearing a wetted face  from tears of the clouds. he sang like a canary  of stories in his lonely journeys, 1, 2, 3 steps to Babylon to drink from nursing woods a milk & some gourds of wine 3, 4, 5 and 6 to Aleppo & lay his heart on the  laughing mountains, awaiting the sky's cry to pour the tears and saliva on the dancing earth, in it; is a pregnancy of Zechariah's tomb. “He once told us how an air take him away to the valley of diamonds & how a river mouth swallowed his town men”. yesterday's night i dreamed, “of our guest globetrotter, stole our lands into his pinched pocket to sell its men for slavery to the night hunting owls, while the trees cried out of war our men flies out to Cairo & leave him die slowly  of thirst on a hot desert”. Bio: Mubarak Said is a Nigerian poet,essayist and short story writer from the great city of Gombe. Hi...