Buildings blacken like the sky,
And hovels their roots beneath
The earth, run like fingers to Ghana,
Street skirted by masts, narrowed
Down to fires twinkling like stars,
Broadcasting from windows to
Old Oyo, the cinder of red houses
At Bodija, stars of the Cul de sac,
Martins and martins on electric wires
That without supply hyphenate the
Horizon, crickets occupy the hinges
To the door, a way of darkness
Animating a voice, the gloaming
Paints a girl before me, micros crawl
Up the road like cicadas, the wind
Always blow empty, its reeds slapping
Against the back door, billowing in
Through the webbed louvres,
Its Rottweilers somewhere there is
A bank, as I saw a void replacing
The gauntly alcoholic that once stood there
And remembered a beer bottle in hand
When he’d jumped in front of a moving van,
Where he spun, etc.
