Diepreye

Abecedarian in Which Òrìṣà Ọya Warns Nigeria of Imminent British Occupation

Second Runner-up for the 2024 American Literary Review Poetry Contest, Judged by Denise Duhamel

Acres of purslane and tamarind surround us.
Baobab branches shelter us from the heat. In this kingdom, I am the Red King’s choice
concubine no more. He has crowned me wife number three. God-
dess of air and calamity. Gossips claim Ọbà sliced off her left
ear to steal our husband’s heart. All lies. I tore it off with my teeth.
Filthy witch. Someone had to stop her. Ṣàngó has not ceased
groaning and weeping. He wants her back? Ah, what a spineless savage!
Hookworm! I should have snatched out his lungs years ago.
If he ever sneaks into Ọṣun’s hut again to cry into her caftan, I will hand him
jute ropes to hang himself from a cashew branch.
Kettle of moringa leaves simmer on the hearth. The cocktail keeps me
lean, tantalizing. I aim to expect one more time.
“Mark my words, aya mi, this next fruit won’t shrivel like the last eight,”
Naked Ṣàngó comforts me.
Of course, he cannot see that I slaughtered all our children,
painted my belly with blood fetched from their fresh jugulars. Their spirits vanishing
quieted my madness. With number nine, I must—Shh, or the village will
rally for my ruin; burn me alive in the marketplace.
Sane women do not survive this realm. Insane women do not survive at all.
Two fortnights ago, I shoved my sister-wives into the incinerator.
Understand me: they have not metamorphosed into rivers. Their ashes and black skulls made me
vomit into my okra beds. But now that the hags are gone, I can start—Ah, almost forgot!
Western bullies are approaching! Cat-faced Lord Lugard and his sharp-nosed
ex-novelist wife. From the banks of River Niger, I spied her ugly
yucca sailor hat. Their plans?
Zap us all. Brand our land, “Nigeria.” Run off when they get lonely.

Diepreye is a Nigerian-American poet from Charlotte, North Carolina. She is a second-year Rackham Merit Fellow in the Helen Zell Writers’ Program at the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor and an Assistant Editor for Michigan Quarterly Review. Winner of a 2022 and a 2023 Academy of American Poets’ Prize, her poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in poets.org, Epoch, Up the Staircase Quarterly, Rising Phoenix Press, and elsewhere. She is a 2022 Best New Poets nominee.