Annette’s Ode

Slithering through incisor-gap, English leapt
from your lips to mine, a string
between you & me, ringed

with hot coals we slide back & forth
in the air like abacus beads. Coals
that warm & warn: lighting the way
as best they can, although

Yoruba is the exact shape
of the bulb in the room, & we have,
like plants learnt to tilt

in the direction of that Light,
prayers pouring out of you unhindered
like water from a hose

left in the lawn all night, every
cranny of me grateful to be
soaked & nourished

Annette the gap-toothed,
You kissed a man & I was born. You gave him
your laughter & he built an empire,

died, leaving you to mourn. Your one love,
muttering psalms in the grave’s dark
wishing he could return, seeing only

your gap-tooth in the distance
thinking it a door, through which
years ago English leapt, lip to lip

anxious to fulfil the injunction of blood.

Pamilerin Jacob’s poems have appeared in POETRY, Lolwe, The Rumpus, Agbowó, Palette, 20.35 Africa, & elsewhere. He is the Founding Editor of Poetry Column-NND, Poetry Sango-Ota, among others. His manuscript, Blight Fantasia, was a finalist in the Walt McDonald First-Book Poetry Competition 2024.