The Boy With Emerald and Tears
Your heart is a fractured song
Limping across the notes in a stuttering progression
On some days, you try to write your story
On the rivulet of tears brooking down your face
But the only memory a water body holds is a picture of a drowning dream.
You’ve tried to find your mother in a song
But whenever you sing
If feels like sending love across the ocean on a paper boat
And watching it drown into depths beyond saving.
On some nights, you throw your eyes into the skies
Hoping to catch a shooting star, or maybe follow it
But rather, all you find is an army of angels
Lending you feathers to make your own wings.
Adie, the world is waiting for you
There’s a path carved into your palms
And in your eyes is a swirling galaxy of gemstones
Placed there by God himself
To remind you that you are your own light.
if I could speak to you through a poem, I would say
Birds with broken wings still fly and sing
And boys like you with tears and emeralds in their eyes
Can still dream and smile.
© Ifiokobong Etuk
Ifiokobong Etuk (KING of the QUILL) is a Nigerian student, poet, writer, podcast editor, and broadcast producer. He writes poems about ideas that are often undermined such as trauma, boyhood, and their development into manhood.
His works have appeared on; thepeaceexhibit.com, Fiery Scribe Review, The Shallow Tales Review, THE MUSE JOURNAL; A Journal of English and Literary Studies, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, BANSI Issue III, etc.
The Loch Raven Review 