God’s Creations Are Little Shameful Things
darkness didn’t come first
else, why would I have to hide in it?
>>>>>in the beginning was light and sound
light—to reveal my uncovered heels
Paris’s arrow is biding time
Achilles wears a fool’s garment,
why else would a warrior fail to watch out?
sound—to tell us we have no place.
silence makes god’s creations parallel with
pillars in a dark hall:
static, un-rattle-able, eternally swollen with
loneliness
>>>>>in the end was shame and hush.
come. stand on the ruins of troy and all fallen powers.
see, their eyes are rolled behind their lids as an
emblem of shame
lightning flashes, mocking the contempt the darkness conceals
Ocean Vuong calls the human eye ‘god’s loneliest creation’,
and i tell you: it
resists touch, resists company, and holds nothing, except tears.
have you ever seen a boy drowning?
why would he stick out his trembling hands if not that he needed a friend?
lightning flashes, showing the boy the emptiness, the silence of the streets
a boy gasps and brings down his hands—the way teary eyes hide behind their lids.
god’s creations are little shameful things
and he has flung us into the light.
Contributor’s Bio
Elisha Oluyemi is a writer of psychology and literary fiction. He won the 2022 Lagos-HCAF Writing Contest (Prose) and came 1st runner-up in both the Shuzia 2021 Short Story Contest (2nd Ed.) and the 2022 Flash Fiction Competition. Elisha was shortlisted for the 2022 Young Writers and Creatives Award (Short Story Category). He co-edited the PROFWIC Crime Fiction Anthology, Vol 1. He’s the founder and editor-in-chief of Fiery Scribe Review, a literary magazine.
He works as a manuscript editor, a ghostwriter, and a graphic/book cover designer.
Elisha has writings published/forthcoming in The Bitchin’ Kitsch, Mystery Tribune, Brittle Paper, African Writer, Shallow Tales Review, Kalahari Review, SprinNG, Sledgehamme, Arts Lounge, The Dawn Review, Ngiga Review, OBBLT, Nymphs, 100-Word, Salamander Ink, and elsewhere. For fun and relaxation, Elisha learns Korean, listens to classical music, and studies criminal minds. He tweets @ylisha_cs.
