The Origin of Butterflies

Loneliness

I do not want to write how lonely

a car parked under the rain

in a deserted road sings,

but I’ve been on this journey for ten years,

searching for a boy to translate the sweetness in my language;

searching for a door out of the fear sitting inside my throat.

Nothing is constant; birds die & are reborn as clouds,

leaves go into the earth to become songs,

yet my love is passed down as sin,

nailed to the wall in a city where my body

is full of strange men begging to live,

nailed to balls of fire falling from the mouths

of preachers shouting in fields.

At night I sit in silence to hear my body

mingle with the stars in darkness.

I know how loneliness sits in a deserted town

and plays dead songs from parched lips.

I know how a body enters itself

to hide desire behind sadness.

I’ve been sitting for a long time,

waiting for a boy to heal the confusion

falling in my heart.

The rain keeps falling & I don’t know

if the birds rising in my heart

is my body saying it’s alright to love

this wildness walking into a city on fire.

Romeo Oriogun