every room is a knife
the dining table
a blade
we must
chisel our bodies
till we do not look like
what kwashiorkors our being
thing is
the moon begins & ends
the day
the sun is just a middleman
singing the woes of the day
into the bellyof the night as if
to mean
joy is for the morning
but
here every day is the mouth of a gun
longing to give our bodies
to the godsof the earth
Flourish Joshua, Frontier XX, is the winner of the 2021 Salt Nation Poetry Prize. He’s appeared in London Grip Poetry, miniskirt magazine, Olongo Africa, Poetry Column NND, Blue Marble Review, Five South Journal, No Contact, the Indianapolis Review, Agbowó, the minnesota review, Magma Poetry, the Walled City Journal, & elsewhere. He is the Founding/Poetry Editor at Olúmọ Review, Associate Poetry Editor at miniskirt magazine & a Best of the Net nominee.