Lizard-Tailed Force Of An Argument Poem by Felix Bongjoh

(i)

An argument grew
into a stretchy elastic band
crawling along,

a lizard a slithering tail
in a snake's mouth.

Swelled into a round
bushy mane
and a lion's gape
swallowing the full-bodied lizard,

its tail wrapped in fog
and shredded
with a grindstone's hands

into smoky mist
drained off
into the ashes of a dying
roasted memory.

Are the gray woven
gray streaks
not caught in an artillery loop,

no gazing reef knot
to hold and tighten loose ends
growing into shreds

and the glassy wings
of tiny brittle insects with no
whistle-blowing mouths?

(ii)

An arrow-tipped mouth
a hoopoe's coiling sharp curve
breaks a trunk's body,

as the hoopoe swells
into a spear
hurled to shatter

a sky's beaming glass
into shards trembling
amid stars from a silvery spar.

It's flung off and let to float,
a wounded comet,

the albatross stretching a wingspan
of night turned moon's daylight.

A sky expands
into the silvery lake of a day
drowning all jewels

in the rising waters
of the sun-steered lake, slow waves

wagging the tail
of the cobra that half-swallowed.
the lizard, both cobra

and lizard drifted to a silty shore,
where they're hooked
into the fangs of ants
carrying only stone-headed matchsticks
to ignite the argument

into a new unborn worm creeping
into an uncovered hole
blowing horns and hornets
when a light wind hovers to its death.