Damilola Omotoyinbo
this is the year 2006
Or according to the CDC, it is the most common type of dementia. It is a progressive disease beginning with mild memory loss and possibly leading to loss of the ability to carry on a conversation and respond to the environment.
& my grandmother is still alive.
i promised to build
her a house. buy her a car. but all i have become
is a poet, writing her body back to life.
she will die, in this poem. slowly and silently
in her sleep—out of old age, if you ask me.
my name did not slip out of her memory—
she did not stare vacantly while we threw
ball in our little yard.
i think we exist for the stories—the tales we’ve shared
—when they elude us, we also lose our sense of belonging.
in this story,
i did not read up Alzheimer’s disease at the school library,
watching her shrink as it became worse.
2006 &
the sick smell did not persist in the house.
i did not see her lips quiver.
her hands did not tremble. i did not wonder
at how we’ve always lived an inch away from death.
2006 &
she died in her sleep.
everyone deserves a pleasant death.
Bio:
DAMILOLA OMOTOYINBO, Frontier XIX, is a Nigerian Creative Writer and Software Engineer. She is a fellow of the Ebedi International Writers’ Residency, the winner of the SprinNG Writing Contest, a co-Winner of the Writing Ukraine Prize, the winner of the 2023 Writivism Poetry Prize, a joint winner for the SEVHAGE-KSR Hyginus Ekwuazi Poetry Prize and a finalist for the 2022 African Writer’s Awards. She has work published or forthcoming on Lolwe, Olongo, The Deadlands, Ake Review, AHC, Torch Literary Arts, Agbowó, NND Poetry Column, The Nigerian Tribune Newspaper and elsewhere. Damilola studied Biochemistry, and her happy places are Pinterest, YouTube and The Church. Tweets @_Damilola_O.
