Father is Hungry

Issue 05

Word Count:


Jonathan Ukah

Jonathan Chibuike Ukah lives in the UK with his family. His poems have been featured and will soon be featured in Atticus Review, Ariel Chart International Literary Press, Boomer Literary Magazine, The Pierian, State of Matter Magazine, Skylight 47 Literary Magazine and elsewhere. He is a winner of the Voices of Lincoln Poetry Contest 2022.

Darkness growls around her,
as she perches on a low stool
in our desolate kitchen;
Sudden snaps of the hibiscus
In a flagrant display.
Hollow vessels litter the floor,
rocked by the evening wind.

He flounces in snarling
Like a boiling kettle,
Eyes bloodshot, teeth grimacing,
With a lashed-out tongue.
Explosive cracks of breaking feet
Stunned the stool under her.
Father sags on the floor
Like a bag emptied of onions,

Where is the food?
Echoes in the darkness,
A sing-along, endless memory
Written on tablets of blood,
Like desecrated monuments,
Like the wooing of the wind,
In a stormy night.
She falls off the stool,
Blinded by love.

My head shot through the window,
Guilt straddling my face, my heart,
Telling me it is a mirage,
This quest for harmony
Or peace, or brotherhood,
Whatever that brings calm to bones.
Father’s power is flecked with ire
Of an inner darkness
Of a mountain screaming in my soul.