Love Buried Underneath the Earth
Omolabake Salako
Content Warning: death
The third time my soul shifted out of my body, through the enlarged holes of my Mother’s flour sieve & submerged itself within the bowl of her grief, was the moment I knew– I was the remnant of my Father’s love. My parents were two roots, from different plants– one was a weed & the other was a crop. They were natural enemies, yet bounded by an affection they believed was greater than the earth– love. So, they swallowed the earth & embedded their love– it was theirs to grow & I emerged. My first heartbeat was the sound of hope they needed & through the tender cradling of my fragile body– I became the skeleton of their love. As my eyes grew watching my father dance sonnets to my mother, my body became the reservoir of their affection– my limbs held two decades of sweet memories & my heart effused their passion. I became a young woman with a mine of Afro-hair & my thighs grew more robust than my Mother’s. Father would compare me to the roasted chicken we enjoyed on special occasions– but the true resemblance shared was we were both my father’s favourites & had beautiful brown skins. Yesternight, I heard my mother whisper unholy prayers calling forth death beside her cake batter & the love inside me smothered my lungs. She kept saying in a chant, “Father was the crop & I am the weed that strangled life out of him.” I exhaled silently, remembering how Father devoured Mother’s cakes on most mornings with happiness floating upon his face, despite having too much sugar in his blood. No one knew, until the sugar fermented throughout his body & his heart painfully surrendered. Today, we buried the sugar with his body where his roots first collided with Mother’s & I finally said to her– I will always carry my Father’s love.
Omolabake Salako is a Human first, Poet/Creative Writer from Lagos, Nigeria. She's an old soul whose works are a fusion of graphics, spectacles & sounds. She is passionate about humanity– with a phobia for being photographed. Her works have featured in Afro literary magazine, Nnoko Stories, WriteNowLit, deCurated Art Gallery and elsewhere. Connect with her on IG: @thecreativelung.