Before the mannequin got used to having
Her head in the clouds she was
Down with her arse in the mud
Again, up again, down again,
So we did flame photometry
To check for blood levels,
Hooked up a stabilizer
So mood current flows easy, like jazz,
Though always with a good chance of
Flying out of the swing.
II. Serenace
And then there were voices
Commenting, voices commanding,
Delusions of control, broken down
Boundaries of the ego,
Self, non-self,
Paranoia, catatonia, hebephrenia,
Clutch beyond the pyramids, earth
Tremors, akathisia, neck twisted taut,
Eyes rolling upward to heaven.
Peace be still.
III.Prozac
The nihilist creed: I am
Nothing, have nothing,
My body is
Nothing.
Gilt edge of guilt,
Barbie singing suicide as redemption
Song. Designer drug, Euphoria by Ralph Lauren.
Now you can always feel high,
Negotiate existential angst.
IV. Ativan
The cold cast eye of the
Horseman riding by,
Buried trauma, the anguish of
Sleepless nights, nights of watching
Al-Jazeera hours go by,
Till terror-stricken eyes slide shut
And the finger grip goes slack.
Niran Okewole is a senior registrar at the Psychiatric Hospital, Lagos, Nigeria. He won the MUSON Festival Poetry Prize in 2002 and 2003, and the Berlin International Festival Poetry Prize in 2008. His poems have appeared in ANA Review, Mindfire Review, African Writing and Africanwriters.com. His collection of poems, Logarhythms, was published in 2005.
March 12, 2009
That Tune Clutches my Heart shortlisted for The Ethel Wilson
Fiction Prize
January 22, 2009
Robert Bringhurst wins American Printing history Association Award
February 10, 2009
New From Gaspereau Press
