SQN - Sine Qua Non - Issue Two - Journal - Page 38
SINE QUA NON
murderer, into Cain. Look at my
bloodstained hands, my bloodshot
Eliongema Udooa
eyes. Look at me, the wild animal without a
home. Here, in this desert, we can no longer
Paternoster
see our burning Rome. Here, in this desert
where the only thing left to do is to wander.
Luke 11:12— What father among you, if his son
asks for a osh, will give him a snake instead?
Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion?
Camp to camp, pillar to post. All we have
is memory. |e garden in the memory.
|e curse. And what do you remember?
Everything. Everything a body should forget.
& what further distance than this could a boy—terrioed,
nee from the masculine hand holding out an ofering of brutal
memories to him—this arm carved like that of his father?
Once, we cowered in the shadow of His terrioc presence:
Child & mother—human punching bags. Skins branded with
bruises bearing His ongerprints. Mother, clinging ormly
to the frayed hem of their threadbare union.
Last line attributed
to Romeo Oriogun
Every scar on this body I have concealed beneath noral tattoos.
A failed attempt at masking my paternity—this nightmare
leeched to the worn-out silhouette of my childhood.
I consult Google Maps to measure the potency of my escape:
10, 671.04km away from home, & its tainted memories.
Still, this question bothers me like the tantrum of a persistent
vision: what distance is required for allopatric speciation?
I have been so brave at battling my fear, these years bear me
witness, how I have spent the entirety of my monochromatic
life, convincing this self not to metamorphose into Him.
Won't you celebrate with me, mother, what feats I have
accomplished? How great a distance this apple has rolled from
the foot of the tree? How despite what facial similarities the
mirror divulges, I have turned out nothing like Him?
Every anger raging within me I have channeled into walls
& shattered furniture. & the girl I love, I love wholeheartedly.
Even though at times this body falters, like that one time,
Vexed, I yelled at her, & His voice thundered out my throat.
I rummage restlessly through the net. Still, I ond no name
for the fear of becoming like one's father. |e search results
50
51
