a debacle— a child with an autism
Bààmí & his words hamstrung me.
he said, my existence will bring a debacle.
that an inborn autistic is not a human.
& every day his anger rise like a vesuvian
temper. scourge, slaps & punches
are best food he ever fed me and Mààmí.
i, too, have a world, full of blues and silence.
i was only seven why i watched Mààmí eloped.
she was tired of my ail & derision from people.
Àlàbí & i became wanderers like a hunter’s dog.
hatred is my best friend—we grew up together.
Àlàbí—my brother & friend bite the dust.
he became a decrease for me to live.
no one can protect me again.
i am truly a disaster as Bààmí said.
i live in my brother’s dream—as a doctor.
i save people from going to heaven like my brother.
i have saved Banji, Ronke, John and 99 others.
yesterday, i saw Mààmí, she was flustered
of her action, but proud of me as a manna.
she said, Bààmí have a cancer. i was too
grieved to hold scalper and cut him open.
this morning, Bààmí’s body became cold and stiff.
i was unable to save him from going to heaven.
he should have let me love him for once.
i shouldn’t have been born as a debacle.
Bààmí—my father
Mààmí—my mother
Àlàbí—an eulogy of a male child.
Ismail Yusuf Olumoh is a Nigerian creative writer and teacher, a poet, a spoken word artiste, a graphics designer, a content creator, and a video editor. His works are published and forthcoming in Nanty Greens, Eboquills, Fevers of the mind, Poemify Publishers, Festival for poetry, De Curated, Synchronized Chaos, Willi Wash, World Planet Anthology, and others. He writes from Ilorin, Kwara State. When he is not writing, he enjoys reading or cooking
