You could tell the garden city was about to get on fire just before it burst into fire. Not the usual kind of burning, 

just a slow simmering in the wind. Soot filling every cathedral of lungs like incense before an altar. That is to say, 

we had to live in nose masks for weeks. That is to say, people got sick, & you could never leave anything 

holding liquid standing. Even our bodies, even our eyes’ salty seas. The rains falling heavy & black— 

nothing was spared the communion of ash. Be careful what you think, what you drink, what you breathe— 

this air, not just air— there are much deadlier things. There is the mild one— the black dust, & the wild intent 

for unliving. The past becoming paradise. There was a time when every girl ran home with hibiscus petals 

in her hair, in white dresses that remained white long after being worn outside. It was the moment the fruit 

was eaten— the one forbidden, our eyes opened. It was there we realized we were never going to be the same. 

& there would be no point in returning. & sometimes a garden is not entirely beautiful, until it is engulfed 

in flames.

About the Author:

Marvellous Mmesomachi Igwe is a budding poet from Port Harcourt, Nigeria. He has been published in Arts Lounge NYC, Poetry ColumnNND, Poetry Sango Ota, and more. He was also a finalist for the 2024 Kofi Awoonor Poetry Prize and the 2024 Dawn (Review) Prize for Poetry. You can find him daydreaming, listening to his favourite singer Lana del Rey, or writing about limerence, melancholia and the mundanities of existing. He tweets @mesomaccius.

Feature image by Ruvim Noga on Unsplash