Gone with the War

you crawl out of the debris, ashes and smoke

with a choking cough and clouded eyes

your thin right hand plunge like an intruder into the hot air

you reach for the echoes from the mouth

of the silent street

where is father

whose footsteps you could hear through the ears of your heart

where is mother

whose hands emit the aroma that could kidnap your nose from your face

where is teacher

who controls the chalk and the cane

behind a blackboard of alphabets and numbers

silence and sadness settle on your outstretched palm

and you let the tears drop like falling angels

Samuel Oluwatobi Olatunji is the Assistant Managing Editor of Expound. He has been published in a number of journals, magazines, anthologies and blogs such as Black Heart Magazine, Black Communion (Poets of the New African Poets), Rolling Thunder Quarterly, Footmarks: Poems on One Hundred Years of Nigeria’s Nationhood and elsewhere. He is the co-editor of The Rape of Death, an anthology of poems. Currently, he is studying English at University of Lagos, Nigeria. You can follow him on Twitter: @Mr_Samitude