Two Poems - “Aubade” and “Joy was Duty”

By Olaitan Humble

Aubade

 

first a girl becomes a quantum particle doing

jumping jacks in Balmer series/ then we say

 

the girl is invisible because a rivulet

of benediction flows in her umbworld

 

she tries fitting herself into a model of utopia

mornings pour into the day like molten gold

 

suckled from the sun/ like klein bottles

denuded from their disorientation

 

she is driven/ driven by her therapist's

addiction to alprazolam & times

 

she plant a boll of torment

in her own garden

 

driven/ driven by her friend's ability

to swim while she drowns

 

drowning in tears of yesteryear

& the gas that fills the air

 

when her mother cuts onions

now she is stuck/ stuck in a limbo

 

& an endless perambulation

of penrose stairs/ like vectors

 

in hilbert space she is trapped as

a placeholder/ driven by the days of yore

 

a staccato of sonic booms forces the girl

out of utopia then we say amen to living

 

in seclusion/ we say: dear lord if we are

to die let it be on our birthday

 

& should our body be cut to pieces

open a breach & thrust us into afterlife

 

as if to save Alfonsina Storni from drowning

or to say: fender-bender cannot kill doppelgangers

 

 

Joy was Duty

 

Ghosts plague this house

& tonight, it's time to party.

 

Calisthenics on the penthouse,

birds perch over the rooftop

 

gathering information

as the sun sinks

 

below the horizon.

Birds as ghosts.

 

Ghosts with avocado

hand, & joy was duty.

 

Father sipping

coconut milk,

 

he breaks a nut

open, then chants

 

incantations.

He mounts a bird

 

on the back of a cauldron—

shedding its skin

 

feather by feather.

He catches the moon

 

in a stainless steel spoon

& dips it in his mouth.

 

Once, he peeped the world

from a skyscraper

 

& the only sane scene

was from a cumulonimbus

 

cloud collapsing

into his mouth

 

& on his tongue

were ghosts

 

jumping in & out

of an electromagnetic field,

 

& joy was duty. When

he weekends far away

 

from home, he stays true

to this house's insignia.

 

Once, he caught the sun

in a ladle, then dipped it

 

in a furnace before carrying it

in his pocket, & joy was duty.