A poem by Chris Abani

Taken from severeene at devianArt


Dear Derek Walcott, Patron Saint of Shipwrecked Poets:


I am not Crusoe, though I might want to be.
I am a man. That much at least is not
desire. I am building a fire, a funeral pyre
for the attavus. For the ritual. I am
burning to ash in my desperate signaling.
In the distance. A fire burning and a man.


Chris Abani
(Taken from the book, SANCTIFICUM)