In the hour when Lagos heat forgets its name,
a figure steps out of the bleach-white noon
like a negative held too long to the sun.
Head shaved to the bone of thought,
scalp shining like a fresh coin
pressed from the mint of midnight.
No hair dares grow here;
even follicles have fled
to safer countries.
The face is a desert after rain:
every grain of color washed downstream,
leaving only the architecture of grief
and the stubborn geometry of cheekbones
that refuse to apologize.
Eyes:
two drops of ink spilled in milk,
rimmed in yesterday’s kohl,
staring straight into the camera’s small black guillotine
as if to say,
yes, I have already been executed;
now watch me walk.
And the mouth—
oh, the mouth is treason in high definition:
a single stroke of crimson
slashed across the snow,
so wet it looks stolen
from the heart of a still-beating rose.
It does not speak;
it detonates.
Collar high as a dictator’s wall,
white diamonds quilted in perfect formation,
each stitch a tiny prison
holding the throat hostage
from screaming the truth.
The light is merciless,
a flood from heaven’s interrogation room,
stripping pigment, stripping mercy,
until the body becomes a rumor
told by marble to the moon.
Yet somewhere beneath the alabaster,
a pulse rehearses its comeback:
slow, deliberate,
like highlife drums under curfew
refusing to die at 3:27 PM
on a Monday that tried to erase you.
This is not a portrait.
This is a resurrection
wearing lipstick as ammunition
and silence as Sunday best.
Look long enough
and the ghost looks back,
smiles with that red slit of a mouth,
and whispers in Yoruba, Igbo, Pidgin,
and the oldest tongue of all:
“I am still here.
Try harder.”
a figure steps out of the bleach-white noon
like a negative held too long to the sun.
Head shaved to the bone of thought,
scalp shining like a fresh coin
pressed from the mint of midnight.
No hair dares grow here;
even follicles have fled
to safer countries.
The face is a desert after rain:
every grain of color washed downstream,
leaving only the architecture of grief
and the stubborn geometry of cheekbones
that refuse to apologize.
Eyes:
two drops of ink spilled in milk,
rimmed in yesterday’s kohl,
staring straight into the camera’s small black guillotine
as if to say,
yes, I have already been executed;
now watch me walk.
And the mouth—
oh, the mouth is treason in high definition:
a single stroke of crimson
slashed across the snow,
so wet it looks stolen
from the heart of a still-beating rose.
It does not speak;
it detonates.
Collar high as a dictator’s wall,
white diamonds quilted in perfect formation,
each stitch a tiny prison
holding the throat hostage
from screaming the truth.
The light is merciless,
a flood from heaven’s interrogation room,
stripping pigment, stripping mercy,
until the body becomes a rumor
told by marble to the moon.
Yet somewhere beneath the alabaster,
a pulse rehearses its comeback:
slow, deliberate,
like highlife drums under curfew
refusing to die at 3:27 PM
on a Monday that tried to erase you.
This is not a portrait.
This is a resurrection
wearing lipstick as ammunition
and silence as Sunday best.
Look long enough
and the ghost looks back,
smiles with that red slit of a mouth,
and whispers in Yoruba, Igbo, Pidgin,
and the oldest tongue of all:
“I am still here.
Try harder.”
