The Game Poem by Felix Bongjoh

Their game
Of hide-and-seek builds
Herringbone weaves
Among the leaves,
Windows for protruding
Necks peeping space
To strike off
The intruding pigeons

Floating on tumbled
Withered leaves
Behind the plenum
Of rising walls shooting
Higher and higher

At sky on a ladder
On a thousand ladders
Climbing to build
A thick roof of spider
And leather clouds,

As a game of palisaded
And fenced-in camps
Builds bald eagle
And African jacana nests

Nesting weavers
Of hand strokes and brushes
Stone-made to spin
On spines sipping
Miles of storm waves
Brushing strokes
Sweeping space like condor wings.

How hands ride backs
On a trip
To hide-and sick, when stars
Roll off hot faces
Throwing spears at each other,
As a tide of love rides them
To hollow spaces.

And after the game,
Partners burst out
From their leafy
And flowery camps
To exchange squiggles
And scribbles of smiles

Etched and shone to kill stars
On brightened faces
After a cruising trip
To the mantle of creeping flesh.