Tabernacle

By Chinedu Gospel

if this poem is an eye empty of sight,
then, you'll wade across every line with 
a lantern in your hand. you'd stare at a 
metaphor until it breaks into dawn. 
if you believe in miracles,
hear my testimony: i have many
broken pieces. they all have cuspids.
they wound me. i leave some behind.
i still carry some everywhere. 
and, t b h, healing is a scar on my tongue. 
wingless birds singing psalms without
notes. & i am searching for a conjunction
to join me together with a miracle. my 
frail faith failed. my friendliness failed.
my fosterage failed. even my beauty failed.
in my garden, angels fall as rain. but there 
is no flower hymning hosanna in the highest. 
no petal pinking its way to bloom. no breath. 
no death. just a boy staring at this poem, 
​searching for light

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Club 69

By ​Chinedu Gospel

...because the man who tastes of gin also tastes of fear...
                                                                      –Romeo Oriogun

Hear the songs. At club 69, we start with physics.
The when of a boy's death is the speed of an
incoming bullet. Hear the clink of the glasses from 
the bartender's table. Boys trying to harden themselves
with one, two, three bottles of gin. But, I have been 
in this club for far too long. Now and then, I hear the
bartender saying, swigging three bottles of gin doesn't 
​make you higher than God. Nor stop a cop's bullet 
from driving into your skull. & for the dead in this country, 
I have held many psalms under my tongue, watching 
every one of them ferment into blood — an illness in 
my voice. Sweet sickle song. To stay alive, I made a canoe
out of the ocean of my eyes. And I crossed every shore 
but could not find a house where hope resides.  
                               

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Chinedu Gospel, Frontier IV, is an emerging Nigerian poet. He writes from Anambra where he also studies. He is the moderator of audio poetry at Threposs poetry community. He won an honourable mention in the Kreative Diadem annual writing contest 2021 (poetry category). He also won the StarLit Award for the winter issue 2021 of Aster Lit. He has seen his works published in Agbowo, Icefloe Press, Claw & Blossom, Rough cut press, Walled city Journal, Poetry column NND, Midway journal, Rigorous magazine, Feral poetry, Afro Lit Mag & elsewhere. He plays chess / reads poetry when he's not working. Say hi on twitter @gonspoetry & IG @gospelsofpoetry