If You Were Here

Poem by Jonathan Ukah

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If you were here, I would stretch my hand
to touch your forehead with my heart;
Perhaps, I would not have fallen into the river.

In the afternoon moon, you suck the dews with me,
my skin would not have melted like chocolate
when the teeth of the sun chewed up the waves.

I was walking alone along the thorny road
where you and I met over ten years ago,
the oak tree fell across my path, blocking my way.

Then I knew that this ambush was not a fresh war;
it had curled into the forest, mingling with the leaves,
and when you were not there, it acquired guns.

Though it did not hit its bewildered target,
I heard the waves rushing behind me,
I heard water rasping like a thirsty cobra.

How all these things would not have happened
if you were here ready to eat the storm,
with laughter, armed with chisels of our destiny.

The day you left, thunder crashed into the mountains,
a spark and all the bushes burned, fire burst to the sky,
turning the grasses into a puddle of raspberries.

I knew that one day it must be the only day
when you would wake up to answer the raven’s call,
and I would see the rain, but threw away my umbrella.

Never mind this midnight moan; I have grown new claws,
like a plant from a seedling to a flourishing young bough,
I will tear the sunlight and watch it glide down the east

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Jonathan Chibuike Ukah is a Pushcart-nominated poet living in the United Kingdom with his family. His poems have been featured in Atticus Review, Unleash Lit, Written Tales, Propel Magazine, Clockhouse and elsewhere. He won the Alexander Pope Poetry Award in 2023 and the Editor's Choice Poetry Award in 2024.