World Without Sun Poem by Felix Bongjoh

(i)

Folded up, creased
and squeezed
into me by me,
I cough out my world.

I sneeze out
the last slurs I chewed
quietly last night
without a hiccough.

I kick off
the trash, as it lands
in a culvert full of ants,

an ant
emperor of all
big beasts.

With its milk teeth,
an ant together
with armed brothers
stings the sleeping elephant

typing it up
with ropes of sister ants
creeping, mouths filled,

as they swell
into a larger elephant
chaining this one
with their snailing crawl.

The wriggling chained
elephant
trumpets out a call
for help, but who cares?

(ii)

An undulating
goat's ringing bleat
slashes
me into bits

of a red-mouthed
beast,
its doors shut
and bolted,

as it gulps
down air's flesh,

having licked off meat
from another
three-eyed, five-eared

growling animal
with rust-edged canines
that bite off only air.

(iii)

It's been raining rivers
and lakes for
stringed light years,

the rain's roof rattle
weaker than
a dragged whisper
landing in a trapped hole.

I rush to the window
ringing with that whisper
only to find

a small bird in soaked
creased jacket it cannot flap.

Dive in friend or the storm
will devour you
I beckon to it,

but the bird only
rolls off eyeballs
imprisoned in their lids.

I speak to my outer eyes
and ears pierced
like a stretched needle
running through them:

Grab the storm; punch it off.
Stop it with a gust
from a mouth's breathed-out air,

and let my bird fly
into my couch, a bed waiting
for a feathery king.