By Ehizogie Iyeomoan
You can’t come to Abuja Without leaving your stories on her rocky pages You can’t hide your eyes and nose from the Razzmatazz Of that car park around eagle square Where local cuisines speak in multi tongues And hunger vanishes at the sight of
Assorted dishes printed on green menu lists
You’ll first see your face on the leaves of this City Before she finally wraps you in her cold arms Like kolanuts in fresh cocoyam leaves Leaving your skin in the softness and freshness
Of your coming
And if perchance your beauty radiates like the Sun You’ll stroll out one day to see you fixed and Smiling In a notice board, with a bottle of anything in Your hand Or maybe see you standing in an artist’s road Side gallery Where someone you never knew
Would pay to have you without your consent
So welcome to my capital city, mon ami Where laughter is an art in three dimensions Where power seats still on the air with a Horsewhip Like a horseman on a horseback prepared for
Durban
Welcome to Abuja, my dear friend And please before you return to your country Do remember to leave your stories on our rocky Pages For we’ll be needing them for the records, and For our children crazy to see a white man’s
Autograph
About the poet:
Ehizogie Iyeomoan (b. 1990) is a poet, pencil artist and collector of autobiographies. His poems have been published by Kalahari Reviews; Korea-Nigeria transnational poetry anthology; Write Paragraphs, Lyriversity, Word Rhymes & Rhythm, Bukrepublik… He participated in OSIWA poets residency in Dakar, Senegal. His poem, Fulani boy has been translated into Italian and French. Ehizogie won the Korea-Nigeria poetry feast gold prize, March 2015. Fulani boy also got the “targa alut” prize in the Castello do Diuno poetry competition, 2015. He writes from Hadejia, Jigawa State, where he is currently serving the nation, Nigeria, as a youth corper. He is the author of flames-of-the-forest, a collection of poems. He blogs @ http://iyeomoan.blogspot.com and can be followed on twitter @Iyeomoan_Emma and http://facebook.com/ema.ternity.
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- Abuja
- Ehizogie Iyeomoan
- Poem
- Welcome to my capital