Dear God,
I did not come to Britain to fall in love.
I came because of ambitions that must live,
And ambition, unlike heartbreak,
Does not sit around waiting for the weather to improve.

I came for work,
For survival,
For the noble immigrant rituals:
Converting currencies in my head,
Pretending not to notice loneliness,
Learning the exact science of stretching one meal
Into tomorrow morning.

I did not cross continents
To be undone by somebody’s daughter
With a nice smile and a soft voice.

Please, even in my defiance
Lord, keep me focused.

IF there is a woman with healing in her laugh,
Remove her from my route.
IF there is a woman whose eyes can make me forget
The speeches I have given myself
About discipline, purpose, masculine restraint—
Let her bus arrive early and mine late.
IF there is a woman who says my name
In a manner that pleases my ears,
Confuse her tongue.
IF there is a woman
With enough sense to ask whether I’ve eaten,
And danger enough to ask what happened to me before I became careful,
Lord, I beg you,
Hide me.

I have done this before.
I know the symptoms.
First, you think she is harmless.
Then you begin to remember her jacket.
Then her laugh.
Then the way she looked at you
Then suddenly you are writing poems,
Checking your phone like a teenage swain,
And rearranging your week to miss a shift
For a person who may not even like you that much.

No.
I reject it.

Make me industrious.
Make me unavailable.
Make me the kind of immigrant
Whose only love language is direct debit and overtime.
And if, despite this prayer,
I still fall, being the eyes often betray,
If I still find myself one evening
Smiling at my phone in the cold
Like a complete and decorated idiot,
Then please, God,
At least let it be for someone deserving
And let me look dignified doing it.

Amen.

 

 

 

 

 

Photo by Schesco Nyarwaya on Unsplash