today is 16th of october, the day you died
and your mother gave birth to a baby girl.
i showed your elder sister, ummu sulaim, the picture,
and words flew out of her mouth like a violin(ing) tongue
nawal ta dawo, nawal is back.
believe me, i have drifted into night’s sleep searching
for where i will zephyr you into a dream of a baby
with an un-punctured heart, un-pausing breath.
but I heard the wind whispering your name nawal.
is it true that you are back, in flesh and blood,
or has our prayer broken open a grave in your mother’s womb?
Zaynab Bobi won the Gimba Suleiman Hassan Gimba ESQ Poetry Prize ’22. She is a rising star on the Nigerian literary scene and one of the key female poets to look out for from Northern Nigeria. She tweets at @ZainabBobi