1. Our heroes labour in vein

Of what use is a heart if it cannot love
For shedding one's blood for another's sake
Is a mystery of passion, uncommon and rare
One that only divine charity can understand.

Your body bears the token of pain
Adorned by ornaments of grief
You carry scars from battles you fought
For people and country 
In your life, love is synonymous with loss
With warm blood dripping from fresh wounds.

Because it is easier for a warrior
To bleed and die on the battlefield
Paying ransoms for the oblivious tribe that 
Does not recognise the voice of its anthem
Than to hide in the cold safety of apathy
Allowing the heart to freeze and numb.

Which one is harder, braveheart
To love a mother(land) who 
Buried your afterbirth in a minefield
Or to forgive a father(land) who  
Stripped you of everything good
From innocence to laughter
To the name you used to bear. 

Or to defend a country that covers you 
In shameless bloodbaths and lies
Murdering your voice in burning buses 
And stolen livelihoods and inflation and strikes
And your life's work reduced to ashes
Dancing in the face of your afflictions while
Monsters defile your toddlers on the streets.

You rupture your vessels, pour out your love
Crying out in agony, begging the dark sky 
To cave in on you, like a final sacrifice 
In a cold, lonely, unmarked grave
Transcending the flesh, fighting and praying. 


For parents who murdered you
For a people who betrayed you
For friends who abandoned you
For a nation that scorns at your grave.

Yet you love / you pray / you fight
You bleed for them all
And not even death can stop you. 




2. Trial by fire

The hotter the furnace, the greater 
Purity a dore can attain; Behold the
Radiance that blinds Sol Invictus.

The law of transcendence reckons 
True enlightenment is preceded
By willing pain; raging flames; and
Loyalty to the wisdom of the artisan.

So while the altar whistled in flames one
Easter morning, I overcame mourning.
But delighted in the burning chalice
Melting into glowing fine gold.

Afterwards,
I carried the smelted chalice  
On my palms all over the city. 
24 carats for free to any soul
Who wanted eternal light. 

JL Maikaho’s manuscript was a finalist in the 2022 Nigerian NewsDirect Chapbook Awards. Her poems and short stories have appeared in Parousia Magazine, Trouvaille Review, Brittle Paper, Kalahari Review, Nantygreens, Eboquills, World Voices Magazine, Nnoko Stories, 50WordStories, Spillwords and elsewhere. She has also been longlisted for the Bill Ward Prize for Emerging Authors and shortlisted for the MAFEELDA Essay Contest. JL  is a SprinNG alumna, writes from Gombe, Nigeria and tweets @JLMaikaho.