Delivery in Ilorin

Abdullah Jimoh O. | Poetry

The man, not yet vicious, is in the corridor of the hospital, 

Perambulating with weak limbs. Self-talking— praying to 

God with a hot-spicy language that burns his pink tongue. 

Courtesy of him, a woman is in the labor room, lying on 

A bed — a potential commuter to heaven. Here, he is a cat 

In a swimming pool that the doctor is trying to rescue. 

Trepidation too is an art that he has mastered mindlessly. 

The doctor says the baby is a kinglet that feels the vagina 

Is too small a gateway for him, he says a wider opening has 

To be made by scarpelling her tummy. So they give the man 

A prayer-mat and a kettle to perform ablution and reach out 

To God. The cold water of the plastic kettle burns his skin, 

The Arabic and Yoruba languages with which he prays 

Incinerate his tongue. He chews the ash and continues 

To beseech God until around 12 am when the nurses spank 

the baby's buttock, saying E wo bo se tobi to fa, se o fe pa iya 

E ni? (look at how big he is, do you want to kill your mother?). 

The baby's cry, like rain, appeases his desert-hot body. Ilorin 

Is close to heaven they used to say, like an outskirt of a town. 

But the night feels like he has just returned from hell. And  

Thanks to the rain-cry that cools off his ember-like body.

Abdullah Jimoh O. is a linguist and a budding writer. He finds delight in creativity. His works have appeared or are forthcoming in the Mudroom, Kalahari Review and Afritondo.