Smoke Reminds my Little Brother of our Old Home
(a poem ending with lines from "The Great Gatsby" by F. Scott Fitzgerald)

How I manage the sight of smoke 
from my mother's kitchen and not remember 
that I once lived in a home where fire burns 
everything that has a body, I do not know.
My little clone remembers that there was 
a scar behind his back, something he got
from a blind bullet during the war that claimed
our land and thanosed us out from history. 
I came from the village next to the one near God’s nose.
He must have grieved watching us burn into embers.
The smoke on the mountain behind our tabernacle
draws the portrait of my brother’s memory on the sky.
Yes, he remembers the fire and the embers of a city.
How do I tell him we're the fulfilment of what's written?
That every gathered cloud would rain water through
heaven's eyes and not fire     bomb     bullet?
I understand there's still a dent of black 
		on his rainbowed heart, 
but every trace of grief has gone with the old earth.
So we'd beat on, boats against the current     
borne back ceaselessly		                 into the past.

About the Poet

Blessing Omeiza Ojo  is the Chairman of Hill-Top Creative Arts Foundation, Abuja. He is a contributor to literary journals with poetry surfacing in The Deadlands, Cọ́n-scìò, Arts Lounge, Split Lip, Olney, Praxis, and elsewhere. He is the mentor behind the birth of several teenage poets, authors and slam champs. His works have been translated into several languages including Yoruba, French and Italian. His literary awards include the 9th Korea-Nigeria Poetry Prize (Ambassador Special Prize), the 2020 Artslounge Literature Teacher of the Year Award, the 2021 Words Rhymes & Rhythm Nigerian Teacher’s Award, and the 2022 Maryam Aliyu Award for Best Teacher (Male). He is presently a creative writing instructor at Jewel Model Secondary School, Abuja, Nigeria.