Osieka Osinimu Alao is a Nigerian writer, poet, essayist, editor, scholar, and a media and culture enthusiast. He has an MA in Creative Writing from Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge. He was longlisted for the Akachi Chukwuemeka Prize for Literature 2024, and Toyin Falola Prize 2024. His works are featured in The Offing, ANMLY, The Shore, Ta Adesa, The Beatnik Cowboy, Muse, African Writer Magazine, Rigorous, International Human Rights Art Movement, Pepper Coast Lit, Kalahari Review, Lumiere Review, PoetryColumn NND, and elsewhere. He is @‌ooalao_ on X & Instagram.

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POETRY

race: all things impure/ all things impaired

By OSIEKA OSINIMU ALAO

I’ve shriveled/ into puddle/ pounded/
my bones/ into biomes I don’t belong/
jettisoned the spirit-spin/ at the junction/
of the salacious/ and self-adulation/