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Announcing The Bridgette James

Flash Fiction Competition 2024

 

This year’s WINTER Flash Fiction Writing Competition opens on Saturday 19 October. Entrants may submit an original story not exceeding 500 words on the theme - Love is Transient.

Genre- Romance Fiction

Maximum Number of words – 500

Prize - $20 USD – PAID Via Western Union

Deadline- Noon, Friday 13 December 2024

Judges – Award-winning Jamaican writer: Lergon Parris, Bridgette James.

Submit – by Dropbox at www.ellaspoems.com or via email: ellaswriting@mail.com

I reserve the right to add  a third competition judge to read entries anonymously.

Rules

  • All entries must be in English.

  • No AI generated content or plagiarised material allowed.

  • Stories must be previously unpublished and should not have been submitted to any another writing competitions.

  • Your flash fiction must be a maximum of 500 words (excluding the title). Though there is no minimum number of words, contestants who write to length fare better. Any script over 500 words will not be read.

  • Your submission has to be on the theme: Love is transient, but you may choose your own title.

  • You must complete your personal details on the submission form and include a contact email.

Welcome to Penned in Rage

An online Poetry and Flash Fiction Publication Featuring African Writers 

A Literary Journal
Please scroll Down for Poetry, Flash Fiction & Photography By underrepresented Writers

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Submit By Email-
ellaswriting@mail.com

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NEWS

The inaugural Bridgette James Poetry Competition was won by Nigerian Poet, Clement Abayomi with his poem Flight. Abayomi has been featured on Writers’ Space and is an English Language and Literature student at a University in Lagos.

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About Bridgette James

I'm a British Writer born in Sierra Leone, West Africa. I write poetry  and various genres of short stories.

I've studied English Literature, Social Policy and Criminology and worked in the UK as a Police Constable. My chap book Anglo-African Rhymes is to be published by L.R. Price in 2024.

I've been published recently in the following Magazines:

​

Publishing History

My poem won the Fiction Factory Summer 2024 Competition

https://fiction-factory.biz/winning-poetry-competition/

A poem of mine appears in the publication below:

CERASUS Poetry Magazine # 3: Amazon.co.uk: Wilks, John: 9798340513328: Books

A poem of mine was shortlisted for the Renard Press 2024 competition

 Building Bridges Anthology – Poetry Competition – Renard Press

I was shortlisted for the Bridport Poetry Prize, 2024.

Wildfire Words, August 2024

Two Poems Appeared in Lothlorien Poetry Journal

Lothlorien Poetry Journal: Two Poems by Bridgette James

OS6 June-Aug 2024 (wildfire-words.com)

The Lake-

July 2024

https://www.thelakepoetry.co.uk/poetry/bridgette-james/

London Grip (December 2023)

https://londongrip.co.uk/.../london-grip-new-poetry.../...

 

Gutter (March 2023)

Dreich (March 2023)

Wildfire Words (5 times between 2022 and 2023)

https://wildfire-words.com/rem-poetry/#Bridgette-James

 

Fib Review

https://musepiepress.com/fibreview/bridgette_james1.html

 

Longlisted for the Aurora National Prize 2022

https://writingeastmidlands.co.uk/bridgette-james/

 

Bristol Noir short stories (2023)

https://www.bristolnoir.co.uk/flash-fiction-dont-knock.../

 

Our self-published anthology, What the Seashell Said to Me (2022) has been legally deposited and is available in the National Poetry Library (please see attached photo).

https://www.amazon.co.uk/.../B0BNJHYV7T/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?

 

Misjudged and Misperceived published by Zambia Arts Publication 2023.

 

Historic publications

1. Lice in the Lion's Mane 1995 (editor, Dr Hannah Hope wells; deceased).

https://openlibrary.org/.../OL232.../Lice_in_the_lion's_mane

2. Songs that pour the heart 2004 (editor, Gibril Sesay).

https://www.worldcat.org/.../songs-that.../oclc/62268752

3. Kalashnikov In The Sun 2009 (editor, Kirsten Rian).

https://www.wolfboewig.de/kalashnikov-in-the-sun-an.../

Pleasant Title

Featured Poems
and Stories

Publishing House
found poem.jpeg

Pleasant Title

I Found a Poem In Old Newspaper Clippings

[Copyrighted, B. James]

​

I grew up with forbidden words-

                   S*X, kisses, boyfriends

         could not leave my mouth.


 

Mum spoke in tongues

Dad was a lay preacher.

                     Let me learn to say foreign words-

           Santo Domingo, roll them out like cigars.

                                      Let me say banned words -

(insert one), Hitler, in your ears under the quilt.


 

Hold your naked body, pass into you

          inhabit you as an endoparasite:

a MeYou. Say things to make you blush

in the ‘soir’, whisper French, red-lettered syllables.

             Appear on front page newspaper in Austria

                                            without a care in the world.

​

                                            Se defendra

'Woman Lets Her Parents Down'. Shout

               expletives at the bedroom wall

and re-live in you – a born-again lover.

A poem by Eniola Olufemi from Nigeria. Also available on Medium. Republished with Poet's consent.

 

I Saw a star slide down the sky,

Blinding the north as it went by.

Sara Teasdale

 

If dreams were stars

They would be gases of light

Arms length from the universe

They would die like falling stars

Whose spark was never found

And whose twinkle was never valued

 

If fallen angels had dreams,

They would fall like Icarus

Who painted the sky his tears

And the sea his blood

They would fall

With the flaming passion of a dying star

 

If desires were seeds

We would plant them into a tree

Forbidden to all who might trespass

The fruit would become dreams

Dreams we claim to be forbidden but still blinks to all in the vast sky

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Why I became a mermaid

[A Poem by Bridgette James]

​

I shouldn’t have gone to my aunt’s birthday party in 1999

dressed as a mermaid. I did, emerging half-woman, half-fish

a mystical creature from a twenty-third floor flat in a high riser.

​

My sister heaving like a whale, shoving me from behind

into the narrow lift. Trust you to be conspicuous.

Neighbours staring and pointing- Look, there’s mermaid.

​

I was hiding conspicuously in plain sight beneath an air of mystic.

Eyes protruding from gaping holes

on an amphibian face, on the look-out for fishing nets.

​

Torso and legs scaled up, safe from wolf-whistles.

No catcalls on the underground. A man asked,

Why did it smell fishy going through the tunnel?

​

In the hall, guests nodding at my sister

avoiding me the conspicuous cluster tagging behind.

People don’t look for women when they see a mermaid.

​

Even a female in fancy dress, because women are social constructs,

glittered up to the nines in sequins in magazines, online, on the catwalk.

The woman in the mermaid wore lacklustre pearls - a sea of problems.


 

Fully clothed in attire, I wriggled though party goers, unnoticed.

Since then, I’ve donned an imaginary costume in awkward scenarios

hiding under scales of false bravado in a mythical body.

Midnight Train

A poem by Eniola Olufemi from Nigeria. 

​

I've heard of crossing the bar

and visions of being on the wrong side of the grass

The reaper sharpens its scythe

ready to catch souls who float up with daisies

I've thought of a one way ticket

that takes you across the rainbow bridge

 

Grey heads with coins in their eyes

take turns on their path to eternal freedom

Young bloods who were caught up

too early thinks its a path to the wasteland

They wear wooden kimonos

and yet so light to float across a tunnel

 

Have you ever wondered how

light flashes on and off before your eyes

You're certainly not Jackson,

but you do the moonwalk back and forth

They say death is a path to life

For me, death is beauty, It's change, it's freedom

 A Flash Fiction

COPYRIGHTED  Lergon Parris

​

      Fear gripped my throat with icy hands, restricting my ability to form words in the darkness. Perhaps the fact that the elevator was dark helped to mask that fear. Or perhaps it was the fact that the other members of my party were huddled in the centre of this steel box whimpering and shivering, too preoccupied with their fear. The teacher, Ms. Edwards was also immobilized by fear, as she was the centre of the huddle. I stood to the side, trusting myself to the body’s natural method of calming itself as I assessed the situation. We were stuck in an elevator in Cuba. I had a less-than-basic grasp of the Spanish Language, and as the only male of the party, it behoved me to exercise some semblance of bravery. Yet the steel box was dark and menacing. The grip on my throat was slightly released, and I swallowed hard.

​

      Our evening had started as routine as every other since we embarked on this school trip. This time, we had visited a ceremonial cannon firing, and I marvelled at the dominant sound of the old weapon as it fired its projectile across the sea. So far, there were no regrets on this trip. Cuba held its beauty with dignified and individualistic hands as its unique culture impressed our eyes, ears, and taste buds at every turn. Surely the camera roles were ripe with indelible memories. Ramon, the tour guide, and bus driver was an expert storyteller, adding to the majesty of each landmark with insightful facts. All of this resulted in hours feeling like minutes, and days seeming like fast-forwarded VHS movies. So, when the sun was exiting the stage on that day, my mind had groaned derisively. Because this meant we were going back to the hotel for dinner, then sleep. Twenty-four hours were just not enough.

BY Falade Funmilola

FLIGHT

Silent wings outstretched

Soaring through the vast expanse

Leaving earthly bounds behind

Embracing the unknown

In the realm of the sky

Freedom's pure essence unfolds

Unfettered by gravity's chains

The spirit takes its rightful place

With each beat, the heart rises

In tandem with the wings' gentle caress

The world below, a fading memory

As the horizon stretches, endless and wide

In this weightless, timeless space

The soul finds its true home

Where the wind whispers secrets

And the sun shines bright with an eternal glow

                   

Silent wings slice through the air

As the earth below grows smaller

A soaring escape from gravity's chains

Freedom's pure essence unfolding

In the realm of the sky, worries dissolve

Like wisps of cloud, they disappear

The world's vastness stretches out before us

A canvas of endless possibility.

With each beat, the engines pulse strong

Lifting us higher, beyond fear

Through veils of cloud, the sun shines bright

Illuminating the path ahead

In this weightless, timeless space

As the plane banks and turns

The earth's curvature reveals itself

A breathtaking arc of blue and green

A reminder of our place in the universe

 

Flight is transcendence

A journey within and without

A soaring exploration of the self

And the boundless expanse of human potential

     Making our way into the hotel lobby, we were immediately entranced by the now familiar soft guitar strings of live Cuban music, the melody ordering our steps as we moved towards the lift.

​

   Carla, jokingly described as the slowest member of our little group, was true to the description. As we assembled in the elevator and the door began to close, the straggler made a desperate sprint, grabbing the metal frame of the door and upsetting the sensors. She achieved her goal of joining the group, but the elevator now protested with darkness and immobility. I stood in the corner closest to the door steeling myself against fear as I occupied my eyes with the faint movements of my huddled group. Ms. Edwards had still not recovered. I knew that it was up to me, a fourteen-year-old boy tasked with one day becoming a man to take charge of the situation. It was me against the menacing elevator. I could feel the steel box taunting me, discouraging me, closing in to suppress my will. But I fought with desperation as my mind rifled through a metaphysical rendition of my Spanish notebook.

​

    Then finally, with lion-like triumph, I banged on the steel doors and shouted.

    “Ayudame! Ayudame!”

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My Dearest Elliot

A Historical Romance Fiction by Lergon Parris from Jamaica

​

The floral curtains danced modestly and gracefully as they entertained the flirtatious breeze from outside bringing romance on its breath. Blinded by their passion, the curtains failed to see the apple tree just outside the window also dancing as it was the recipient of the trickster's magic words. Having captured the hearts of the naive curtains, the breeze moved through the window and onward to its next conquest leaving the nubile curtains now dancing like harlots.


The woman in the room closed her eyes as the breeze caressed her soft face, inviting lingering memories to the forefront of her mind. She rose from her desk, the soft frills of her expensive gown brushing the bottle of ink and spilling it on the letter that she had been writing. Nimbly, she grabbed the bottle, saving most of its contents. With a frustrated sigh, she fulfilled her initial reason for rising and closed the window, rejecting the breeze's advances. The woman then retreated to the desk and looked down at the now ruined letter which she crumpled between her hands. She then reached for another sheet of paper, dipped her quill in the remaining ink and started her new letter.
My Dearest Elliot,
How are you, my love? I hope this letter finds you well. I see that you have not responded to my previous letters but that is alright. I will continue to pour my heart into each one and hope that they provide you comfort on your harshest days.


How fares the war sweet Elliot? I ask not for its outcome, but I wish you back to me. I do miss you, Elliot. I miss you as any devoted wife misses her husband. We were freshly married right before fate's cruel hand took you to war. Such is the nature of our world; it is however a cruel outcome. A husband should be with his wife, and a wife her husband.


I have to resign myself to your memory. The cherry blossoms have started to beautify the tree, our tree. That beauty however does not hold a candle to the symbolism of the 'M' and 'E' letters so lovingly carved on its trunk...


"Margaret! Margaret!" the girl's attention was arrested from her letter by the shrill voice of her mother calling from the room's door.


"I have brought your supper, my dear, oh please try to eat something." This was followed by the clatter of crockery as the tray was placed by the door. Mother had long since given up on trying the handle of the door as it was never open.


"Oh Margaret, I pray that you find the conviction to eat my dear. Your flesh will wither away with this sadness." After a long unanswered silence Mother exhaled in defeat and turned away from the locked door. Margaret dipped her quill once more and continued her letter.

Oh Elliot, I preserve myself for you and live for the day when I hear a knock at the front door and open it to find your cheerful face looking back at me. As I write this, as always, I am wearing 'the' dress, you know, your favorite. This is the dress that I was wearing when you first asked me to be yours. Do you remember?


Sweet Elliot I end this letter now my darling, but I will write again. I will write to you every day until you answer, or I see you walking up to our porch.
Yours now and forever,
Margaret.


       She picked up the paper and scanned its face for a few seconds, then she neatly folded it and placed it in an envelope from the desk's drawer. The woman then gently rose from the desk and walked over to a table in the far corner of her room, where she placed the envelope on a neat stack of similar envelopes. Margaret then proceeded to reopen the window.
The rejected breeze was no longer there. It had licked its wounds and was now travelling out over the farm as the cows grazed contently in the pasture. It touched the cheeks of Margaret's mother who scarcely noticed it as she pulled the latch on the wooden gate and exited the yard, her face a mask of worry. She walked up the little hill to the lone cherry tree and spoke to the solemn looking man standing there looking down at the grave.
"She still refuses to leave her room, and she seldom eats." she was addressing the man.
"It is sad." he never averted his eyes from the grave as he spoke. "Such is her grief for my son that it begets denial."
He sighed then turned to the woman. "So young and deprived of the joys enjoyed in a youthful marriage." he placed a comforting hand on her shoulder. "While I too grieve as a father who lost a son, I will also say a prayer for my daughter-in-law." He turned and descended the hill with Margaret's mother following shortly after.
The breeze in its empathy put its lustful urges aside and flew to touch the modest gravestone. it read:


                         Here Lies Elliot Pitter
                             1841 - 1863
                       Beloved son, and husband



 

The lady that I met at the sweets shop

 

was buying exotic sweets wrapped in blue and yellow polypropylene.

handpicking colours carefully.       Ticking off her shopping list

like a painter tasked with creating a masterpiece, scanning the small print

to avoid mixing her shades with other similar pigments.

 

                                                                       In her shopping trolley she kept stacking memories of a childhood when she strolled the aisles of life  back home in Kyiv, arm entangled in her mother’s,

before the blasts were heard.

 

“A taste to bring back the sweetness of youth. Hold on to the pleasures of the aftertaste of peace.”

She mutters to me, trusting me with a guarded secret.

 

Eureka! I instinctively re-read the labels on her delicacies in English.

Peace is a candy. Cherish its sweetness.

                                                                    I scooped up a handful of pick and mixes

to suck on, in my underground bunker, in case a Russian explosion shattered

the fragments of my taken-for-granted life.

By B. James

​

"*OLE"

           Ngozi squeezed herself further into the back of the yellow *Molue, the Lagos air thick and sluggish against her damp skin. Beside her, a woman with a headwrap  the colour of ripe mango nursed a whimpering baby. In front of her, two men argued in raspy voices, their hands clenched into fists that rested on their knees. The air vibrated with the competing sounds of the Molue's groaning engine, the conductor's rhythmic shouts of "Oshodi! Oshodi!" and the noise of street life filtering through the grime-coated windows.

​

          Ngozi clutched her worn leather bag, the tattered receipt for her rent payment tucked safely inside. Relief, battled with a rising tide of anxiety. The traffic, as always, was a monstrous beast, barely inching forward on the choked Ikorodu Road. She glanced at her wristwatch, the cheap metal digging into her skin. Ten minutes to four. If she didn't get to Lady Sharon before the rent was late again, the threats of eviction would escalate.

​

        A commotion began at the front of the Molue. A young man, no older than nineteen, his face flushed with anger, shoved past the arguing men. He wore a faded Arsenal jersey, the dirt mirroring the streaks of sweat staining his brow. In his hand, he clutched a dented phone, the screen fractured like a spiderweb.

​

      "Ole! Thief!" he roared; his voice laced with a desperate edge. All eyes turned towards him, a collective intake of breath rippling through the passengers. The conductor, a burly man with a shaved head, materialized at the commotion.

​

      "Wetin happen?" he barked; his voice heavy with authority.

The young man, his chest heaving, pointed a shaky finger at a middle-aged woman seated opposite Ngozi. The woman, adorned in expensive-looking coral beads, met his gaze with feigned innocence. Her manicured nails tapped a nervous rhythm against her handbag.

      "Na that woman!" the young man accused, his voice cracking. "She snatch my phone for inside Oshodi underbridge!"

A murmur of disbelief rose from the passengers. The woman scoffed; her lips pursed in a haughty frown.

"Me? Steal? You must be joking," she said, her voice dripping with disdain. "See how you dress like a vagabond, na so una dey accuse innocent people."

The young man's face contorted in fury. He lunged towards the woman, but the conductor, quick as a mongoose, grabbed him by the scruff of his neck.

"Hold your ground, small boy!" the conductor shouted. "No fight for inside my bus."

The young man struggled, his voice croaky with frustration. "But she stole my phone! That's all I have!"

​

        Ngozi watched the scene, a knot of unease tightening in her stomach. The Molue lurched forward, the sudden movement throwing the passengers off balance. In the chaos, the woman with the coral beads made a split-second decision. With a practiced flick of her wrist, she tossed a small object onto the floor of the Molue, right where Ngozi's feet were resting.

​

       Her heart hammered against her ribs. It was a phone – the young man's phone, its cracked screen glinting accusingly. The woman met Ngozi's startled gaze, a flicker of something similar to triumph passing between them before her face resumed its mask of innocence.

Ngozi's mind raced. The truth, as thick and suffocating as the Lagos heat. The young man's frustration, the woman's practiced ease. Yet, here she was, caught in the middle with a burden on her conscience.

​

      She looked at the young man, his face crumpling with despair. Then, at the woman with the coral beads, her gaze cold and calculating.  A decision, heavy and difficult, settled in Ngozi's gut. She knew what she had to do.

​

Glossary

Molue: A large yellow bus used for public transportation in Lagos, Nigeria. Often overcrowded and known for their boisterous atmosphere.
Oshodi: A major bus terminal in Lagos, Nigeria.
Ole!: Thief! (Yoruba language)

Copyrighted. Ebenezer Moweta is a final year Medical student in Nigeria.

Colorful Black History Month African American Girl Instagram Story.png

the man online breathed fire

smoke engulfed his words

 

they fell on my ears- embers

he said- I HATE...

 

the ground sparked up flames

accelerants scorching my toes

 

they pierce my soles into my soul an

inferno blazes he wrote- I hate you,

 

a stranger because my mother taught me not to love

any woman because my dad told her she was lower than

 

tree roots; he typed in his lingua franca – I HATE you

because you were born to be chaff sifted by males -

 

unfiltered husky rice on a winnowing fan -

discarded like ashes trampled on underfoot

Nuture Seeds- B. James

The man on the internet swung a pendulum at me.

I was online shopping for nude tights.

He wrote, “Clasp it with both hands, press it close to your chest, wear it like a second skin.”

​

My sister was crouched underneath an Orange tree, clutching pips in her hands, muttering secrets. “Look, I found two heart-shaped ones- I’d be lucky in love and fly to England.”  

​

In my mother-tongue they say where you plant an Orange tree there it will sprout fruits. The wayward breeze blew her wishes erstwhile like the woman’s on the TV saying, she found a man twenty-six years her junior on Tinder. 

​

I replied, “Life begins at forty.”  Daredevils are those who through caution to the wind. The subtitles bring me back - a boomerang: Woman’s Nubian Lover Was a Scammer.

 

I log off, scribble a wish on a post-it note, “To nurture my sister’s pips, I want to fly back to Africa.”

 Thorn in my side

“  "She’s been complaining about side pain all week and tossing and turning in bed.”

My older sister Ayodele blabbed to our mum, Theodora as we sat in the cluttered living room chatting. My mum looked at me in a concerned way.

   “Which side?” I went silent; too scared to speak. “Right or left?” I only had two.

   “Where’s the pain? Omotayo?” My mum inquired raising her voice as she addressed me by my house name. I knew I was in trouble whenever mother called me by my full West African name and not the one used for school- Bridgette. Fear however engulfed me; my brain was closing in between its barriers- my ears.

​

I knew I was seriously ill. The piercing sensation in my right side felt like a needle was lodged in my intestines. My whole stomach must be lined with the chillies my mum spiced Cassava leaves and Jollof Rice with. I was paralysed by dread though; I had a pathological fear of needles and hospitals which kept me from confessing to my mum that my right side had felt for weeks like the gardener was running a rake over it.

​

Naturally boisterous, I found my voice eventually and squeaked, “I’m fine mummy. I’m okay.” Lies rolled of my tongue like my dad’s Cuban cigars. The last thing I wanted was my mum to start laying her hands on my flaming stomach reciting the Lord’s Prayer so God would heal me. She was raised to take everything to the Lord in prayer,  guided by hymns we sang at St Augustine’s Church, Freetown. Vexed, my mum looked at me through narrowed eyes, enveloped by huge eyelids resembling folds of puppy skin. She had her mum-radar up and knew I was lying. My eighteen-year-old sister Ayodele told fibs about not having a boyfriend but even by her standards the report of me been too poorly to sleep at night was farfetched.

   “She was limping on the way to Youth club along the cut-through,” Ayodele continued now picking up a pitch and speaking with verbal diarrhoea.

​

My other sister twenty-year old Bamidele who had picked that precise moment to walk into our narrow living room, stopped in her tracks, her rabbit- like ears pricking, listening in, ready to interject with her bit of juicy family gossip. Disappointingly for her perhaps, I went mute. In the deadly silence that ensued the realisation dawned on me that the game was up: my family had seen through my pretence and knew from the intense pain causing me to shudder involuntarily that I needed to be taken to the only hospital in Sierra Leone in 1990, equipped to give an emergency consultation.

“Ring your dad and ask him to come home.”

My mum Theodora barked at no-one in particular in our language. We lived in one of those old 1960s colonial houses, so our house was connected up by cables to telephone poles to the archaic Hill Station Telephone Exchange.

Garrulous Ayodele took it upon herself  to dash to where the grey rotary telephone sat - pride of place on an overdecorated coffee day adorned by a white lace table mat - grabbed its handset attached to the base by an almost out-of-shape spiral cord and dialled my dad, Pa Thompson-Renner’s government office, chubby fingers pushing the dial all the way round the centre disc as if that would bring dad home sooner at rush hour, with that fuel scarcity and roads riddled with potholes.

 I tried listening in but was distracted by the inferno in my right side; our mum’s charcoal fire must have engulfed my entire stomach. My head was spinning from searing pain as a tightening in my side was the last thing I remembered before collapsing on our bare, wooden living room floor.

                                                                 *

            When I came round, there was greenish vomit on the single bed with the most uncomfortable mattress on which my undernourished  five foot two inches frame seemed to be laying, prone. Female voices sounded as if they were coming through the tribal horn in the living room cabinet at home. Someone was being violently sick- me, and a woman’s rhythmic voice was explaining in Pidgin with large hands convoluting around her bespectacled face, they had no utensils for patients to throw up into by their bedside. Conscious of making a mess, which sat me up like a lightning bolt had struck me. Resting my elbows on springs where the mattress foam had worn out living gaps concealed under the bedsheet, I suddenly took in my surroundings, realising I was in the dreaded *Connaught hospital, having probably been admitted there when I passed out.

The voice belonged to a plump nurse now perched on the edge of my already too-tight bed-  how did her bottom even fit? She kept gesticulating with chunky arms protruding from her stained, off-white uniform sleeves at my agitated mum and sisters who were placed strategically in the position of foot soldiers, beside the tattered floral curtains meant to cordon off other bedspaces in the shared ward. But I remember I could clearly see another patient, looking heavily pregnant, laying with legs sprawled out ungraciously on another miniscule bed with a rusty metal frame, writhing in what appeared to be absolute agony. I scanned the dirty ward from the cobweb clad flickering overhead lights to the flooring around my bed, the sharp-looking ends of broken clay tiles jagged my drowsy brain into action.

​

            “I’m going to die here Mum.” I must have muttered, because she stared right through my son, gulped down something which must have been fear and coaxed, “You’d be fine Omo, soon as the surgeon gets that inflamed appendix out.”

​

Her words sent my brain into overdrive, thoughts ruminating. I had heard about *Connaught hospital with its unsanitary conditions and constant power cuts and had the gut feeling that I was probably going to be exterminated in a catalogue of medical errors on the operation table. I had never been hospitalised before, inconceivable, seeing I was definitely an over-active teenager who had climbed all the fruit trees in our huge backyard, while driven by a penchant for the guava fruit, the seeds of which had probably inflamed my appendix. I would squander the whole fruit pips and all after school when ravishing hunger prevented me from waiting until our housekeeper Kadiatu finished preparing lunch on the charcoal stove.

I did not care what had caused the infection. I just knew my life was going to end at sixteen years of age- or my hypochondriacal brain was telling me so.

 “Surgeon? I’m going to have an operation, right?”

This time I fainted again, happily letting my body plummet into its vomit.

 

By Bridgette James

  • = Name changed

Hope By Ebenezer Mowete From Nigeria.

Ebenezer Mowete is a final year medical student.

       The humid Enugu air clung to us like a second skin as Nneka and I weaved through the stalls of the Kenyatta Market on a beautiful Saturday morning. Laughter spilled from overflowing bowls of palm fruit, bargaining calls intertwined with the rhythmic thrumming of highlife music from a nearby stall. Nneka, ever the explorer, pointed towards a commotion near the back of the market.

​

"Looks like there's a show," she said, her eyes sparkling with mischievous curiosity.

We pushed through a throng of bodies, the scent of roasting corn and sizzling suya mingling in the air. There, amidst towering stacks of colourful Ankara fabric, stood a young man, no older than twenty, his face contorted in concentration. A weathered suitcase lay open before him, its contents were a mix of trinkets, talismans, and wilted herbs.

"Ezigbo ndi Enugu!" he boomed; his voice surprisingly deep for such a slender frame. "Do you seek answers hidden from the ordinary eye? Does love elude you, or your business stagnate? Then step right up, for I, Chibuike, the O menemme, the Oracle of the Marketplace, can reveal your destiny!"

       A ripple of amusement ran through the crowd. A woman with a mischievous glint in her eye nudged her friend. "Maybe he can tell me why my husband keeps disappearing to his mama's house on weekends," she quipped.

      Chibuike, unfazed, continued his spiel. "With the wisdom of the ancestors and the guidance of the spirits, I can see your past, present, and future! Just a small token, and your troubles will be no more!"

      Nneka, ever the pragmatist, rolled her eyes. "This is nonsense," she muttered. But the glint in her eyes betrayed a flicker of curiosity.

      Suddenly, a woman, her face filled with worry, stepped forward. Her simple cotton dress hung loosely on her slender frame. "My son," she croaked, her voice barely a whisper. "He's been missing for weeks. The police say there's no trace. Can you help me find him?"

       A hush fell over the crowd. Chibuike closed his eyes, his face adopting a calm expression. He reached into the suitcase, emerging with a collection of cowrie shells. He rattled them in his hand, muttering something under his breath. Then, with a flourish, he threw them onto a worn animal skin spread on the ground.  

      The shells scattered, some landing upright, others face down. Chibuike studied the pattern for a long moment, his brow furrowed. Finally, he looked up at the woman with an intense gaze.

     "Your son is alive," he declared, his voice firm. "He is lost, yes, but not harmed. He is with water, near a place of healing."

      A gasp escaped the woman's lips. Tears welled up in her eyes. "A place of healing?" she echoed, a sliver of hope flickering in her voice.

Chibuike nodded, his expression grave. "Seek out the village by the Ezu River, where the palms utter secrets to the wind. There, you will find him."

      The woman sagged in relief, tears streaming down her face. She reached into her purse and pulled out a crumpled wad of naira notes, pressing them into Chibuike's hand. "Thank you," she whispered, her voice trembling.

     As the crowd dispersed, a murmur of speculation hung in the air. Nneka nudged me, a smile playing on her lips. "Well," she said, "that was certainly unexpected."

I couldn't help but agree. The marketplace oracle gave hope to a desperate mother. This was Enugu, where the line between reality and the fantastical often blurred, leaving us with more questions than answers, and a lingering sense of awe.

Translation

"Ezigbo ndi Enugu": "Dear People of Enugu"

"O menemme": "He did it"

The day I became a mermaid

 

I shouldn’t have gone to my aunt’s birthday party in 1999, dressed as a mermaid,

but I did, emerging half-woman, half-fish, a mystical creature from our

twenty-third floor flat in the high-riser.

 

My sister heaving like a whale, shoving me from behind through tight crevices then into the narrow lift. “Trust you to be conspicuous.” She moaned, neighbours stared and pointed.

 

I was hiding in plain sight,” I explained. I was hiding beneath an air of mystic, my eyes protruding from gaping holes on my  amphibian face, on the look-out for fishing nets.

 

My torso and legs scaled up, safe from wolf-whistles. No guys cat-called me on the underground, a male remarked, “It smelled fishy in the tunnel.”

 

In the hall, guests politely nodded at my sister avoiding the conspicuous cluster tagging behind her- me.

 

I was the only one in fancy dress,  other females came as social constructs, glittered up to the nines in sequins. My costume had lacklustre pearls decorating a humongous fish head. Worn with pride, they came from the sea of problems overcame.

 

Fully clothed in attire, I still splashed, wriggled through chairs, tables, dancers, cumbersome obstacles, unnoticed.

 

I now adorn that costume when faced with awkward scenarios. Charming humans  with an aura of false pretence to hide the real introvert.

A Haiku

By Lergon Parris, Jamaica

A good book can sing
Song sweetly soothing one’s ear
The mind’s secret smile

They Were Lucky to Escape

By Lergon Parris, Jamaica.

"Oh please!” came Arthur’s trembling voice. “Don’t hurt me. Don’t hurt my family. Please!”

“I came to you as a matter of honour,” Stanley’s voice was intimidating, dominant as was his body as he stood over the feeble man trembling before him. “Is that not something to be commended? Am I not a man of honour?”

“Y-yes, Stanley,” Arthur stuttered. “You are an amazing young man, and a man of honour. L-look, I-if you walk away now, we can forget about all of this and move on.”

“There is no moving on!” Stanley snapped. “I never leave a task incomplete. I was a disciplined soldier. Now, I’m going to ask you again, and I want you to remember that it is I, Stanley, MAN OF HONOUR, who is asking you. Arthur Noble, may I have your daughter’s hand in marriage?”

Arthur swallowed hard before responding.

“It…w-well, as I said, it is h-her choice. She has a mind of-.”

“She doesn’t know what she wants!” Stanley snapped. I asked her and she turned me down. Now, I am coming to you, as the man, as the father, and once I have your permission, then it supersedes anything she might say.”

Joseph would certainly not deny that it gave him a personal feeling of pleasure when he kicked in the door and realized that his theory, seemingly farfetched and motivated by his own bias was right. At first, Stanley’s stance was somewhat mocking, something akin to his own father’s condescending scowl. But when the other officers, Joseph’s back up, came in behind him, the celebrated ex-soldier’s disposition changed.

Stanley, Ed’s boy, Stanley, had murdered Spongie because the inebriated man had spouted some criticisms about his interest in Jenny. He had then, himself drowned in the embrace of liquor, found himself at Jenny’s place of work, where he asked for her hand. Furious with her answer, the man had stormed off, waited a few days, still fuelled by liquor, then confronted her father.

Perhaps it was fate, just like the lightning that had illuminated Spongie’s murder, which had led Joseph to his absurd hunch, and compelled him to act on it. undoubtedly, the clearly deranged Stanley would have turned his attention back to Jenny after he had killed her father. But Joseph forced an inward smile at the ramifications of his actions. Arthur on the other hand was a mountain of gratitude. It was not lost on the old man that they were lucky to escape alive.

Extract from Lergon Parris' winning story, in the Easter Short Story Writing Competition, 2024.

To Read Full Story Please Click The Link Above To Featured Writers

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Stanley was one of the judges in our 2023 Easter Short Story Writing Competition.

Poem of Place

 

Every person in this city

is on the mental fringe

Everyday women and children begging for alms

Sisters taken to the street walking naked in the night

Brothers taken to arms making money with their guns,

egunje collectors on the highway,

one sees a broken molue in an ocean of people at the bus stop,

street traders littered.

Lawlessness is on the rise.

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Stanley Chijioke is a Nigerian Poet who studieD  Bachelor of Arts in History and International Studies at the University of Calabar.

By Emerson Sam Navaya, Blantyre, Malawi.

Bitter Fate

 

This bitter fate is equally familiar

When relating to a borrowed-rob Noble Macbeth

Who became excited with three sisters' message

And the play closes up unchecked desire with a fate

He is our own staged in African theatre

 

The theory reveals here the truth

For our own leader was too jovial and the cup fitted

Making confessions that he is palm-oiled

Never he knew that they were ravens

Pronouncing the fate

 

Many people have related him

To Jewish Godly leaders at some note

He perceived nakedly persecutions for the gospel

But not his one

This bitter fate has cast spell on us

Fear

I feel it under my skin cold as ice

As it creeps it leaves bumps in its wake

I can feel it make its way under my spine.

It is a familiar feeling; it is at home in my body

It had camped here when I couldn’t get myself to learn how to swim

And later when I had to speak up for myself in that crowd

Years ago it was when I sensed my best friend's looming betrayal

Then when I didn't hear from him after that big fight a few days ago

Now it's here again making an encore

Within these very dark fragile walls it has seen before.

Is it the stranger walking towards me?

Or just its way of reminding me that it never left last time?

A Poem by Vicky Koros From Nigeria.

 A bird in his nest

 

Perched on his branch a robin. Female breast, feathered colourfully                                                

a male puffed-out chest speaks volumes, brandishing his conceited:

don’t philosophise it, a translation of his misogynistic

patronising tut: come on you must be gagging for it.

A dolly bird. Mating calls mastered over the years

luring a male to his moment of ecstasy in her boudoir

nest of erotic nooks and crannies.

The male stares through centuries of theropod evolution

visualizing a taxidermic Jezebel in her eyes

plumage ruffles disdainfully: you must be

gagging for it, boudoir antics coined

in the heave in your bosom

the sway in your hips

an objectified

human

dolly

bird

​

Bridgette James

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Papa's Kitchen

 

All seasons gone,

near and afar

the bam of pestle

in assonance with mortar

resonating in Papa's kitchen

where there is

never a serene twilight

with clanging of utensils

dancing with sumptuous recipes.

In papa's kitchen

a sanctuary where,

like a craftsman plying his craft

every ingredient comes alive

with the tiki-taka of wooden spoons

seasoning seasons through the seasoning.

Taste that savours my soul.

Like the affluents

 

Papa's kitchen is my restaurant

where the best always come alive

meeting the gluts

even in my grey years to come

I will desire the more.

There is no denial

I have grown in bond

with the familiar flavour

from the corner of suavity

where a man could

eat a mountain of foo-foo

feeling like a possessed being

on an errand of satisfying the belly-bag

always in need of more.

The aroma is in harmony

wrestling with ingredients in earthenware

like a ‘crucified saint

journeying the abyss of hungriness

to meet a bountiful harvest

when mornings' chameleon into nights.

My soul has grown in bond

sating the craving for food

that nourishes my soul beyond

recipe after recipe.

I have eaten the whole world's meal

in the nook of sumptuous creativeness

enveloping a rainbow of aromas.omas.

   A Poem by Osman Emmanuel Kargbo

 

Osman Emanuel Kargbo is a graduate from Milton Maggai Technical University and presently teaches English at a school in Sierra Leone.

Illustrated by Kambumban Chawinga

            From Malawi

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A Poem By B. James

Word of the street is she has an Afro/

knotted with the knowledge her mother handed down in twisted clues/

how Black girls need to untangle the mire

of challenges/ be authentic: afro announcing her presence/ amidst a drive to westernise all things African/ a Black girl’s hair is her Kunta Kinte roots-her true self/ springing back from a scalp encasing a head harbouring generational secrets/ her hair like Martin Luther King’s indestructible spirit /eventually recoiling back into the distinctive defiance of Rosa Parks/ throughout our history/ even when pressed straight with hot irons of hate.

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Illustrated by Kambumban Chawinga

            From Malawi

Dear past

By Shamim  Mponda

 

I have weeded all the burdens

that you watered in my precious heart.

I have chosen to instill peace and prettify my mind

with wise and wondrous thoughts.

All the secrets that were drowning my brilliant soul, I have let go.

I am a free and destined being.

           Poetry by B. James

Aged ten I imagined being dead
                                   was like entering a bubble of life
                          still alive, invincible, reincarnated
in god’s paradise, pampered by angels
I opened my eyes still breathing
in lofty aspirations of growing up
getting married, having children,
growing old but ripe with eternal life
I would outlive the dust I kicked up
the raging storms battering our house
the dust has settled as I grew older
weathered by tempestuous storms
bursting my bubble- if the days of a woman are three score and ten
the aged ten was when I last lived.

I'm a paragraph. Click here to add your own text and edit me. It's easy.

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Illustrated by Kambumban Chawinga

A

little girl

borrows a library

book, dozes off reading

the story. Characters whisk her

off into an ocean of imagination the

instant she flips its pages.

A

line draws

her further in into the sea-world

of make-believe. Images popping up

in her head, through her mind’s eye.

The

breath exhaling

from her nostrils transports

her to a fluid universe of magical

twists and turns, never ending possibilities.

She

dives into

the plot staying immersed in the tale,

wakes up, returns the book minus its

covers to bind the pages of her dreams

into a delightful real life narrative.

The Magical Artist

By B. James

​His pencil sketches fine lines

over the blank easel of life in Malawi

drawing over lines disjointed by poverty

joining them into a continuum of hope.

Focused, he traces over dots, hyphens, erasing blotches.

Filling in a dark canvas with pigments from an artist’s rainbow

    Sue me if you want

 

Sue if you want

but I won't hide

my intentions anymore

I won't let you confuse

visibility and value anymore

I won't let you engulf and digest

my courage anymore

like antibodies I will fight

the germs that me cry

you have given me

the vocals chords

that my brain can't understand

as the hypothalamus and its friends

are taking a nap.

 

 

Sue me if you want

but I won't let

my nerve transition

or muscular contractions stop

I will not let muscle fatigue

from strenuous exercise

stop me from following you.

Like a mute volcano through its space

is not even available to melt and drift

Towards you. I am I here

A Poem by Josiah Kaisi

Sue me if you want

but like agglutinins

I will clump your tears

Lysin- I will dissolve your fears.

Like antitoxin

I will neutralize your sick thoughts

like an anticoagulant

I won't let you clot in agony.

I will let you be smitten with joy

I will not let your pulse rate increase

let you produce more glucose of peace

When I am around you.

 

Sue me if you want

But I won't hold my breath

like lungs I will exhale your sorrow.

Like anaerobes I will still survive

without moisten air or your efforts.

But like cilia and mucus

I will trap your painful old days

and childish character.

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