Emmanuel Jakpa was born in Warri , Nigeria , and is presently with Waterford Institute of Technology, Ireland, where he is a researcher in the Creative Writing Department. He studied at University of Lagos Medicine and Surgery (MBBS) but didn't complete the degree, and studied poetry writing at the University of Iowa. His poems have appeared in Echoing Voice: Anthology of Irish-Canadian Poetry and other major literally outlets. He has won the NYSC Award, Award of Excellence DBS, and the Interact Club Poetry Prize.

 

Sun

On this stable earth, afresh every morning,
You peeked at our fore-fathers trekking
Side by side on the barbed seal of being.

You saw Noah's Flood, the wars of the world;
Saw blood flowed to a flood; man scorched to desert mould;
Earth parted, sea bellowed and roared

Eating up life; thunder applauded fierce wind turns
In crowded places; and the cascade woes of nature
not in ill-will but in seeing that ill was done.

Still you remain unblind, unspeaking, unbleeding;
Feed earth green fingerlings, same as in the beginning.
In your infernal shine is the sternness of will.

 

John Ennis

Upholding the norm of glorious Milton
He funnels the purple light of the age's mirror
Like an aqueduct onto cities of dreams:

Why won’t I, these words in my palm,
so fine, as the polished stone of an onyx,
smile like the face of a fluorescent bulb.