Of Things That Can’t Be Folded Into Metaphors
Taiwo Hassan
I have no vivid memory of ever hugging you, D.
But yesterday, after our phone conversation,
something about your last response felt like
frail arms, stretched, and a warm body reaching to shield me,
as if to say this is what an embrace feels like, Táyélolú.
& suddenly, I’m torn between immersing myself in this strangeness
and allowing my body to become a conductor for this shock, or leaving this
as it is—another bland feeling, a hot cup of coffee that always seems to scald my tongue.
Is this what it means to swallow the saliva of closure
& yet, watch your throat struggle at dissecting its accent
Here I am, beating heart, stubborn body, and tired soul, trying to grapple
with the reality that some things can’t be folded into metaphors
and loving a man is a poem filled with them,
that in some delicacies, salt
can be sweet, and tears can be everything
but a plea of salvation, a flag soaked in blood.
Taiwo Hassan is a writer of Yorùbá descent, a poet, and a vocalist. A 4x Best Of The Net Nominee, his poems have appeared in Uncanny Magazine, trampset, Kissing Dynamite, Lucent Dreaming, The Shore, Brittle Paper, Dust Poetry Magazine, Ice Floe Press, Wizards In Space, and several other places. His first chapbook, Birds Don’t Fly For Pleasure, was published by River Glass Books. You can reach him at +2348109752930 and hassanodemakin17@gmail.com.