Life is a Proper Fraction │ Damilola Omotoyinbo │ Poetry

i am neck-deep in a quagmire, my mind is a
gallery holding the dire portraits of my life

on my flesh, pain has made scars and
incisions that even time holds to ransom

here, my shadow keeps opening doors i
have shut, my mind keeps playing a saudade

call my body a home ransacked by storm, abode
of a stranger birthed on the christening of death

i have tried to live under broken roofs, build
my shelter in the heart of a homeless man

i have tried to fold into myself, make
home out of the cleft of my mouth

i took a trip from pain but was trailed by
pain and its companion, grief

is pain not the after-taste of pleasure
when life itself is fighting to strike a balance

a little dose of pain and a pint of happiness, life
is a proper fraction, but i try to tweak the figures

today, i am the woman building a home
with scars and stories, call me the seer

tomorrow, i will build another
with songs and the wings of butterflies

Damilola Omotoyinbo believes in the power of pen and the positive difference it can make in our world. She has work/interview published at Afritondo, Kalahari Review, Konya Shamsrumi, Praxis, Hack writers, The Nigerian Tribune Newspaper and elsewhere. Damilola is a fellow of the Ebedi International Writers’ Residency and currently a mentee at the SprinNG Writing Fellowship. She is Damilola Omotoyinbo on Facebook & Instagram, and blogs at damilolaomotoyinbo.wordpress.com