i am plucking a few pale stars 

to braid the tale of a sky.

there are times i scour for home

like the first time i saw fire 

quenching light. i woke up 

to see father’s chest stuffed with 

muzzles, mother managed to hold 

her breaths to bid us farewell as 

she withered in flames. 

home is not at home,

because we are water cooked into 

pebbles, because we don’t know how 

to mourn, because the memories

haunt, we carry the photographs

of our loved ones, we calligraph

their names on walls,

bury flowers beneath scenes

where sand is rubbled bodies,

reminisce the light of lost heroes 

in the sun and recall silenced voices

in the stealthiness of the moon.

my friend, Abu, did not die.

in a murky scene, his body blazed,

emitted flames, then smoldered

like he never existed

part of 

Things Fall Apart

in the 

City of Smoke

here, our bodies are rainstorms

and we fall heavily dropping 

with ice—never white, sometimes

we are spillage of crimsoned

liquid that putrefies the earth

because, we can not find home at home.

Etudaye MA is a graduate of Bayero University, Kano where he studied B.Sc.in Mass Communication. He hails from Okene LGA in Kogi State. To him, writing is a great passion, the only way through which real freedom can be achieved. His interests lies in writing, community development, social advocacy and impact through teaching. Etudaye presently lives in the ancient city of Kano where he writes from. His works have appeared on Daily Trust, Afripost, TheCampusWatch, Quenu and others.