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Tribute
for E.
The day you chose to shut yourself off
like a TV screen fading to black
until all that’s left is deafening,
cutting off the world’s voice
as you watched from a muted distance,
they wondered why their concerns,
pressed into you, didn’t reach you—
didn’t open you like a locked door.
They questioned what they missed,
like students unfolding their answer sheets
to find every mark a mistake.
They watched you lie still in that coffin,
motionless, like the box that held you,
and their thoughts wandered through every pain
you must have tucked away,
like the hem of the shirt you’re wearing now
inside that casket. I am one of them,
and I wonder if I still have the right
to call myself your friend. I wonder
why I was so blind—how I never noticed
that even with all the light you gave,
like a lantern in the night,
you were burning out inside.
We only see what we allow ourselves to,
I think, because I can’t say you were hiding.
That light must have been your call for help,
but help only comes when the color turns dark.
I recently read a line in a poem
that compared the pale stain of a moth’s wing
to blood on a murder weapon.
Your light, now etched on me,
leaves a guilt I cannot erase.
Friend, I promise I won’t waste my tears—
none of them will bring you back to life.
I won’t ask how you are, because I know
what your answer would be.
I just hope that wherever you are now,
you are held in warmth and light,
not the coldness this world offered you.
Contributor’s Bio
Joemario Umana, Swan XVII, is a Nigerian creative writer and a performance poet who
considers himself a wildflower. He was shortlisted for the Sophon Lit’s poetry contest and is the
author of the poetry pamphlet titled A Flower Is Not The Only Thing That’s Fragile. He
tweets@JoemarioU38615.
