Love, Begins With Me Poem by Olawale Oluwole

Life gleams and fractures,
Beautiful only if you clasp the future,
A dreamer drafts destiny
On the blank canvases of tomorrow.

Breath becomes a sandwich of possibility,
Or a howl at the modules of vampire nights,
Smuggled smiles flicker across my palms,
Eroding, nurturing, preaching while fate
Sits shackled, crowned in red ointment,
A witness to its own stillness.

Love, I say, begins with me.
It coils through my Father's smoke—
Medicated, pungent, stinking fresh—
He strode to the rhythm of command,
Smiled wryly at the phantom of amputation,
Lecturing in the grammar of travail.

The poor man sleeps quietly
In the heart of his fractured world.
The melody of love rises—
Infant murmurs, spectators read,
Painted colorless across daunted faces,
Weepers bow, shadows echo,
Every day its singular, luminous song.

Love begins with me,
A gravity unbound,
A force erupting through hollow silos,
Shattering streets, tilting skies,
Yet blooming in every pulse,
Every breath, every whispered smile,
The raw attribute of being human.