Forgiveness Poem by Felix Bongjoh

(i)

I toss onto your chest
a purple hyacinth
to withdraw the injury
I drilled down
your broken ribs,

but your snake sigh
won't erase it, won't
burn it
into an unclothed
air of forgiveness.

Your chirp dresses
you up in a cricket's
skips, your wings
lighter
than specks of air
from a cruising tornado.

(ii)

How did my tongue's
slip build
a pick-axe to sink
a deep wound

into your slab,
now broken pieces
of a floor
that cannot carry your
elephant studded feet?

How did tentacles
of me splash
hemlock and nettle
to kill you
with one strike
from a muzzle's mouth.

Let me stitch back
my mouth
into quiet lumps
of moths that settle
on lover's lips,

when they kiss each
other and feel
only weevilled wood pulp,

when morning
sunrays are still spinning
behind far-flung
hills and mountains

(iii)

O tongue light
as a needle
that pierces
with a bleeding burn,

let me pull you
out from time's
pedaled sewing machine,

chunky bobbins
of threads still waiting
to be swallowed

by a machine that sings
on and on
with a canary,

lurks in a tall hanging
tree branch
to wave memory's flag
devouring

a melting song
that won't melt off
like caramel in the mouth
spinning only
more storms of memory.

Men forgive
with bouncing cascades
at a waterfall's mouth
that cleanse,

but leave specks
of silvery water,
a brush of forgiveness
cannot sweep off
without leaving a wet mark.