Jonathan Ukah – State of Matter https://stateofmatter.in Thu, 16 Nov 2023 15:55:28 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.1 https://stateofmatter.in/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/cropped-SoM-Logo-32x32.png Jonathan Ukah – State of Matter https://stateofmatter.in 32 32 I Saw My Mother https://stateofmatter.in/poetry/i-saw-my-mother/ Tue, 05 Sep 2023 13:41:20 +0000 https://stateofmatter.in/?p=2722 I saw my mother straight twice in my dreams
like a roll of moonlight flashing rainbow colours
crouching over me as though she were alive,
her face turned towards me to gift me a smile.
Her skinny fingers stretched out like antique forks
to touch my bony chin and change it to a bed;
her cheeks, all bones, in red, jutted like spires
that rise to the sky and tomorrow is gone
with scattered pieces of clouds around her mouth;
And I felt she had been eating grapes all the time;
we buried her in that busy grave and left her alone;
she winked at me with a white, round-balled smile,
rolling her eyes in their socket like ping-pong.
It must be the persistent knock on my creaking door
which she had come to answer from the grave;
lest I rise from my reverie to open the door,
only to suck in the foul air or hear the grating drone
of war and disaster, earthquakes and plane crashes,
though everywhere was dark in the sea of night
except for a little candle under my father’s old table
that rocked from the soft wind on its last sweet tongue.
When the knock persisted, I hid under the duvet,
my mother hovered over me like a silent silhouette,
lashed out her tongue, green-like palm fronds
to fold me deeper in her arms like a warm duvet.

]]> Father is Hungry https://stateofmatter.in/poetry/father-is-hungry/ Wed, 20 Apr 2022 07:36:00 +0000 https://stateofmatter.in/?p=231 Darkness growls around her,
as she perches on a low stool
in our desolate kitchen;
Sudden snaps of the hibiscus
In a flagrant display.
Hollow vessels litter the floor,
rocked by the evening wind.

He flounces in snarling
Like a boiling kettle,
Eyes bloodshot, teeth grimacing,
With a lashed-out tongue.
Explosive cracks of breaking feet
Stunned the stool under her.
Father sags on the floor
Like a bag emptied of onions,

Where is the food?
Echoes in the darkness,
A sing-along, endless memory
Written on tablets of blood,
Like desecrated monuments,
Like the wooing of the wind,
In a stormy night.
She falls off the stool,
Blinded by love.

My head shot through the window,
Guilt straddling my face, my heart,
Telling me it is a mirage,
This quest for harmony
Or peace, or brotherhood,
Whatever that brings calm to bones.
Father’s power is flecked with ire
Of an inner darkness
Of a mountain screaming in my soul.

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