The Shallows

​Dedicated to Catherine Nathaniel

Image by Gbenga Smith

​I've been thinking,just how sad it is that no one writes letters,

Not anymore,

So I've resoluted to writing you this,

It's not all about the tip of my pen in alpha beta,

For even you know I'm not so crazed a writer.

I know you'll be on that favourite table of yours,

A glass of olive idly sitting by,

Your magical fingers working its way around the brim,

And yes,the rubber pipe,

That too.

Like the sea,this runs deep, so I beg of you to listen.

You said to me, that you've tried to move on, taken a house down town for a change,

I reckon,that you've tried to rid yourself of my presence,

All it is that screams my name,

Right...

You said to me, that you want to bid farewell to all that we ever shared,

That you've tried to hate me,and all that I stand for,

You said you want a new beginning.

Haha, my favourite sofa...you took it out,

If I'm not delusional,you sent it to the woman next door.

Shh shhh I know you're going to flare up when you read this, listen...

She did come around,right? I saw her

Seated at the rear seat, I saw it all.

Yes my love,it was pouring so heavily I felt my heart would drop,

I know... I know...you tried all of that.

In times like this,with the rain hitting rhythmically on my window pane,

I can't help but wonder,were you a better poet than I?

With clattering teeth, I count the droplets,

For each of them , I give a name.

You said there was never an us, yet it felt like there was,

I reckon you said to me that you've tried it all,

You explained how by and by reality hinders your progress,

And how with the rising sun,the truth sets in.

You never really knew,but you're that door,

That door that forever locked me in,

And no matter how hard I struggled with the knob,

I never got to leave that room.

I tried,

I tried to leave, walk down that hall and never look back,

The terrace made me a decision,

The walls slowly closed in on me,

Like your very accomplice, they snatched my soul

I looked out through the window,my one escape route,

The moon bathed me,and smiled down at me,

She said that in that room I'll forever be,

But then the key to that door lay in the palm of my hand,

I asked what she meant, and she responded;

The mysteries that have haunted us, is now in the shallows.

Okunlola Azeezat Olayinka _Zeeyola