by Paul Chuks...Kate’s eyes were blue as though they were molded from the sky and plugged straight into her eye sockets. The black and white spots were an added spirituality...She was black in the way the night did not mean to be.

by Paul Chuks...I enjoy pretending, Like when I’m at the job and My boss bands with me for A hug. I smile emphasizing I like my pay. That way, lord, I want to pretend You exist.

by Paul Chuks...This is my first poem post-depression. My therapist is not sure I’m well because I tell her the world is still grey. Yesterday, I walked past a knife without the thought of blood.

by Paul Chuks Elti Meshau Rain pattered the roof. The hall was quiet, a pin drop would have sounded like a riot. Grime faces stared at their question papers, lecturers paced the hall, more bounce added to their step — a devilish grin that seemed like the grime faces validated their mischievousness. On my seat, the wind stalked me like a stubborn ex. It removed my cap and scattered my hair that I had gripped in a rubber band. A lecturer strolled my way and held my hand as I wa

by Paul Chuks Femi Ogunlana During the mass transfer of 2008 — an occasional ritual where the government takes civil servants from one end of the country to another — your mother was transferred from Sagamu to a place where the sun mistook itself for an angry mother-hen and burned harsher than it did elsewhere in the country: Ogbomosho. The season there in January was as though God had frozen the atmosphere in the previous year and released it with the new year. The road was

by Paul Chuks eniko kis That evening the world seemed platonic, everything was perfect. The walls had no crack in them. The flowers were the blueprint from which others (in the physical world) were created, aged yet unwithered, the sky — a motif of blue that filmed my ancestors reading my poems amongst themselves in heaven. You snuck into my head and sat gently like God had sent you to keep my brain company. Although you were not privy to the biological implications of cohabi

by Paul Chuks Akira Hojo Syncretism can be mistaken for something legitimate, if defined simply as the assimilation or combining of ideas into a new whole. For what history has proven it to be, it is a process of alienation of people’s culture cum profane misrepresentation of their traditions via new improvised identity that serves the purpose of imperialism and colonialism. It is mostly done with religion. The task for the colonialists, after subduing their subjects physical

by Paul Chuks Jordan Bebek When the ulcer in the stomach disappears after a holy visitation from the prophet’s hands. Or when the vehicle tumbles thrice before landing to a crash, as though an invisible spirit launched it from the back — leaving everyone dead but you. Only that the ulcer reneged three months after the testimony and, people died in that crash. * After the trailer had crushed other vehicles — yanking them off its way — the way you imagined Goliath would David w

by Paul Chuks Gani Fawehinmi Park, located in Ojota, Lago / CC-ReoMartins In the course of Nigeria’s democracy and her historical pitfalls with its tragic actors, many activists have risen to steer Nigeria on the path of what they perceived to be true democracy. Gani Fawenhinmi was one of them. Driven mostly by his compassion for the masses, Gani, fondly called “senior advocate of the masses,” was rumored to have handled over a thousand cases, for free — what in legal terms i

by Paul Chuks Alina Fedorchenko I sprung into life as the black sheep of the family. No one told me it’d hurt. Black Sheep is the corrupted word for different. Although different becomes layered when we begin to consider whether humans differ. It is a psycho paradox that has left scholars sweating without an answer for centuries. The debate is not in the biological aspect — every human has a single unique gene encoded in them. It is in the psycho-social aspect. The bandwagon

by Paul Chuks Oladimeji Odunsi The Portuguese sauntered into Congo via the great Congo river in 1488 with the aim of making their state a vast African-Indian empire. Africa was not invaded earlier on due to a long held belief in the Western world that Earth was flat. After it was sufficiently debunked by Copernicus, Gil Eanes, sponsored by Prince Henry, dared in 1434 to sail beyond the area where the Atlantic ocean supposedly ended. It was the first successful voyage southwar

by Paul Chuks deshawn wilson In what is now a hit tweet circulating the ‘muskverse,’ a Nigerian X (formerly Twitter) influencer, from the perspective of red-pillism — a term popularized on social media which means an idea that despises ‘victim mentality’ or weakness, whether true or not — tweeted that ‘Blacks let go of racism and stop fighting for equality because our African ancestors had slaves equally as the whites and had a chance to lead the world economy with their labo

by Paul Chuks To speak a language is to take on a world, a culture, said Frantz Fanon. A fact of language that has eluded us for many years. Perhaps this is why Obi Wali started the campaign for African writers to write in their native language. When writers replied that the most common language in the country was the colonial one, Obi Wali urged the military to overhaul the English language and make Hausa the Lingua Franca. Even the military ignored him and the argument was

by Paul Chuks Gary Scott Man is a yes between two genitals. One body said yes to another & I was born. A cluster of eumelanin strands gather for a hair that serve as mattress for gravity & other things that burn overhead. society calls me black but melanin goodness is what I call myself. Here, I am several simultaneous voices away from grief; one ricochets back to me at the cry for help; others stay for protest. Some days, I am blacker than night, I could nestle in my shad