I invite you into this paradox of love
in solitude.     In this house of silence,
for you, a companion. Visit me tonight
and let us both burn in the divine heat
of bodies. Trust me, I know the coldness
of the heart, frost spreading tiny fingers
upon the body, stretching like fractures,
like a web across the expanse of a room,
of the world, clouding everything it—
touches in the bleak darkness of doom.
Once, devoid of touch and loving, I too,
cursed the world and went to sleep. But
see,     there’s always someone waiting in
the darkest corners of fate, to break you
into every fragment of sweetness. Come,
beloved.      Behind every angel painting
this world in sentient glow, let my finger,
crooked and trembling, map your body
like a naive explorer. Let us trace a route
across unknown waters. Come quickly.
God must not know of this rebellion.

Timi Sanni is a Nigerian writer, editor and multidisciplinary artist. He was the 1st place winner of the 2020 SprinNG Poetry Contest, the 2020 Fitrah Review Short Story Prize, and the 2021 Anita McAndrews Award Poetry Contest. He was also a winner of the 2021 Stephen A. DiBiase Poetry Prize. His works have appeared or are forthcoming in Black Warrior Review, Palette Poetry, Lolwe, Lucent Dreaming, and elsewhere. Find him on twitter @timisanni.