This May Not Be Love | by Ebele Mogo | African Poetry

It may only be a selfish recognition
but what is the difference?
Isn’t all taste a catalogue of neuroses?
Isn’t identity only a lineage of aberrations?
I say ‘this is who I am’, ‘what I love’
but maybe I only mean to say
that this is the closest attempt
(necessarily flimsy still) at carving out a space
for the unknown thing I am
and don’t we underestimate
the extent to which we say ‘truth’
but mean a pitiable and hurried anchoring
of self, for fear of the dark and fear of the light
I say ‘this is where I belong’ but I mean to say
that it was here where I first attempted
to ground my self that being so mercurial,
it may not latch onto some careless breeze and fly away
Familiarity is falsified memory
everything was and is a stranger

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Post image by Ghita Katz Olsen via Flickr
About the Author:

Ebele Mogo is a scientist, entrepreneur and writer. She blogs often at www.streetsideconvos.com