Today we welcome yet another poet to our Poet’s Corner. This quiet poem hints at the possibility of world peace (in my twisted interpretation). Written by Edwin (@edgothboy) for your quiet entertainment.
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IYA BASIRA
The sweet scent of gbegiri soup
Wafts to me as I straddle the bench
Washing my hands over the basin
In Iya Basira’s dingy shack
Perched precariously by the road
It’s a curious looking monstrosity
With arms of rusted zinc
And a skeleton of crumbling wood
Here rank and status disappear
And rich corrupt officials struggle with peasantry
For a place in Iya Basira’s line
Squatting amidst billowing clouds of agbada
washing dirty plates to the
Embarrassment of nouveaux riche wives
The amala is torrid but soft
And the gbegiri soup, bewitchingly sweet
Men, enraptured by discordant flavours swear
Its sweetness is bested only by that of intercourse
Housewives whisper tales of fetish practices
Stews laced with human blood
Amala wrought with powdered skulls
Iya Basira smiles coyly
Neither affirming nor negating
And men flock in droves
To test their heads against
The food seller’s juju
I dive into my soup
Scooped up with handfuls of obsidian amala
But her food is not my only pull
Like a farmer who admires his crops
In another’s market stall
I come to watch others revel,
In delights that are mine to share
Savouring the culinary expertise of Sadiya
My wife, the tastebud charmer.