What if I were to die today, beloved, would your heart stir at all, or would the silence between us deepen into an endless grave? Would you pretend, for the eyes of the world, that you had loved me, that in the shadows of our days you carried a flame you never lit? Or would you let truth, raw and cruel, escape your lips and say, “He was never worth knowing”? I wonder how heavy my name would sound upon your tongue when spoken before mourners, how steady or broken your voice would be if asked to read the words of my eulogy. Would my absence cut through your chest like a blade, or would it wash over you like a gentle relief, as though a long burden had at last been lifted?
For often, in your weariness, I hear a sentence unspoken, that my love itself wearies you, that my presence is not balm but weight. And I, foolish in devotion, still stretch myself toward you like a tree bends toward a reluctant sun. You say you are tired, yet it sounds to me as if you are tired not of days but of me: tired of my words, tired of my arms, tired of the tribe from which my blood flows. My heart trembles with the thought, do you despise the very breath with which I call your name?
If death should come to me as swiftly as twilight, would it soothe you? Would the quiet of my absence give you the peace my living presence could not? To love you has been to walk a path of thorns barefoot, yet still I would choose it, still I would kneel before the altar of your indifference and offer the bruised fruit of my heart. For love, when true, does not measure return, nor count the wounds it gathers; it only asks to give, even unto its last breath. And if that breath comes today, then my only prayer is this, that somewhere in the hollow of your silence, you might whisper that I loved you, fiercely and without apology.
@okelododdychitchats
Category: Uncategorized
New, and New Again
There is a lantern burning in the darkened orchard, its flame steady though the winds conspire against it. So is my heart, unshaken by storm, for it has taken your name as its eternal wick. No night has been so deep that your light did not find me there.
There is a river that bends and bends again, yet never loses its way to the sea. My devotion follows. Each thought of you is a current, each dream of you is a tide, until all of me is poured into the great ocean of your being.
There is a star that stays when the dawn has claimed the sky, a lone sentinel of night’s mystery. That star is the memory of your eyes, refusing to fade though the day demands dominion. Even in the crowded brilliance of life, it is you I see, burning beyond the reach of time.
There is a music that no instrument can summon, yet I hear it whenever your spirit brushes mine. It is the song of beginnings, the hymn that shepherded the first lovers through gardens of wonder. It comes to me as though the world were created anew each moment I think of you.
There is a door that opens in silence, where absence becomes presence, and distance is folded into breath. Each time you cross my mind, you do not return as you were, but as something more, a revelation sharpened by longing, softened by tenderness.
There is a secret, older than scripture yet younger than every heartbeat: that to love is to discover eternity within the hour. I touch your soul not as one who has known, but as one astonished still, as though my lips had just now learned the miracle of your name.
There is, at last, this vow, not sculpted in stone, but written in the quickening blood of a heart undone. I will meet you again and again as though for the first time, a pilgrim at the gates of wonder. And when the world is ash and the sky a forgotten scroll, my love shall still be there, new, and new again.
@okelododdychitchats
Her Candle
The gift of strawberry and vanilla
is sweet, light as breath upon glass,
a fragrance that stays softly
but drifts like memory in the air.
The gift of peach with apricot
is warm, full, and ripened by desire,
a deeper note that stirs the senses,
yet it fades as twilight fades from day.
But her skin holds a scent beyond the jar,
a living perfume no hand can craft.
Her face is the light the flame seeks to imitate,
her spark the fire no wax can contain.
So I do not long for the candle she makes,
nor the perfumes she blends with care,
but for the burn that lives in her presence,
a flame that is wholly hers.
@okelododdychitchats
In the Dust, A Pulse
I like to seek the treasure hidden in the dust.
To lift what is broken, what others have thrown aside,
and hold it until it speaks.
There is a life in things the eye does not see,
a cup that has forgotten the lips it once touched,
a blade that once sang in the air,
a flower that still dreams of sun though it is ash.
I do not take them as they are.
I search for what they wanted to be.
I listen for the pulse beneath their silence,
for the promise that time could not keep.
And in that quiet,
I find something greater than beauty,
the truth that nothing is ever truly lost,
only waiting to be seen again.
@okelododdychitchats
When I Fall in Love
When I fall in love,
it will be as though the earth itself
has drawn breath beneath my feet,
and I will know,
for the first time,
that I am alive.
I will want her always,
not as the moon wants the tide,
but as roots want the rain,
as a flame longs for the wick
that lets it burn.
In joy,
I will laugh beside her
until our voices rise like larks
and scatter in the morning sun.
I will hold her close,
so close that my heartbeat
resonates with hers.
In sorrow,
I will be her shelter,
a quiet roof beneath the storm,
my hands the cloth
that wipes away each falling tear,
my chest the place
where grief can come to rest.
When I fall in love,
every waking moment
will be a prayer of gratitude,
every sleeping hour
a dream where her name
blooms like jasmine
on my tongue.
I will gather each instant,
not to keep it,
but to cherish it,
like pearls
slipped gently through my fingers.
And when I must leave,
when parting presses its bitter kiss
upon our lips,
I will miss her
before I have even gone,
and yearn for the soft resurrection
of our next “hello.”
When I fall in love,
the shadows of old wounds
will wither,
their traces silenced
by the music of her being.
I will find courage
where once there was none,
and I will walk through fire
with bare feet
and an unshaken heart.
When I fall in love,
I will want only this:
for her joy to rise like dawn,
for her soul to sing
as though the heavens themselves
were listening,
for her to feel,
deep in her marrow,
that she is the most cherished
among all living things.
For that is what I will feel
when I fall in love,
with her.
@okelododdychitchats
Why Would Another Man Reach for Another Man’s Crotch?
Saturday morning wears a coat of reluctant sun and wind-whipped dust. The cold has teeth. It doesn’t bite; it nibbles slowly, like a rat on wood, until it finds your bones. Dust hangs restless in the air, stirred by invisible hands, rising in small whirlwinds, then falling, settling on windowsills, eyelashes, and forgotten dreams.
My tap is dry. Hopeless Nairobi dry. It yawns and spits a dry cough as if mocking you. There’s a little water left in the blue bucket outside, barely enough for a quick shower. It won’t be the glorious Saturday morning cold shower I like, the one that sends tiny soldiers running on my skin, but water is water. I strip, splash, shiver, and step out.
I have thirty minutes to leave. Thirty minutes to catch up with Pie, Spiky, as I call her. My Pie. We’re catching up after a long time. 3 months, I guess.
I pull on black pants, last season’s Manchester United home jersey, Puma slides, sling my bag, and head to town.
It’s been three months since I walked these streets. Nairobi always changes when you’re gone. Shops sprout, pavements glow with new cabros, and faces you don’t know walk like they own the city. The streets are sardine-packed, humanity rubbing against humanity, yet in all that chaos, the pavements look…beautiful. Like they are trying too hard for a city that never slows down.
Spiky is on the other side of town, at Iconic Plaza, ground floor. She’s picking out perfume. She chooses something that smells like her alone, misty, woody, quiet but unforgettable. I smell it from those tiny folded scent papers, the ones that look like blue litmus strips, and I know this is a good one.
I’m here inquiring about a phone cover, but I can’t get one because my phone isn’t in the Kenyan market. To appreciate the attendant’s effort, Spiky decides to get a screen protector for her phone.
Next stop is EastWest Fashion for a jersey. EastWest is full. Weekend full. Bodies like migrating wildebeest. We do not find the specific jersey we are looking for, so we move on to downtown, Bus Station. We’re waiting for a vendor at Quickmart Mfangano, Spiky found them on TikTok. They sell good pants. She tries on five pairs and looks super good in all of them. I tell her so, because I am a man of honesty and survival instincts.
We then move to RNG Plaza for phone accessories. RNG is chaos. Shops full of indifferent attendants scrolling on their phones like they’re paid to ignore customers. We move from one shop to another, frustration swelling like a balloon. Just as we’re about to leave, we find one shop, a small, humble spot, where the attendant smiles like they’ve been waiting for us all their life. They listen, understand, do not rush. There is a patience to them, like still water under a hot sun. We get everything we need. We leave lighter, happier.
By now, it’s almost five. We’re hungry, and there is no time to sit and eat. Hotdogs and sodas from Naivas will do. And that’s when the world shifts.
We’re crossing the road when I feel it, a hand. Moving towards my thigh, no, my… flight deck. For a second, my brain refuses to register. Then it does. A touch. A graze. A violation. I turn sharply. An old man wearing a red beanie, black jacket, and ugly khaki pants that hang on him like shame.
My first instinct is to slap him. Call the mob. Let Nairobi justice, swift and merciless, have him. But I freeze. My feet are rooted, and my heart is pounding. He walks past, unbothered, as if reaching for another man’s crotch is a daily errand.
Spiky saves me. She grips my hand, pulls me forward. “Leave it,” she says. Her voice is firm, like a rope pulling me out of quicksand. Thank you, Jaber.
Inside, I’m binding everything by the blood of Jesus. Out loud too. Because, honestly, what else do you do when a strange man molests you on Ronald Ngala Street at 4:57 PM? I bind demons. I bind principalities. I bind ancestral spirits of confusion. Why? Because why would a man reach for another man’s crotch?
As we walk away, my mind churns. Was he trying to pickpocket me? Was he… that way inclined? Or was this some evil spirit manifestation? I’m angry, humiliated, confused. More than eighteen hours later, I’m still here, writing this, still asking the same question:
Why?
Why would another man reach for another man’s crotch?
@okelododdychitchats
I HAVE SEEN BEAUTY BEFORE, BUT NOT YOURS
Not for the dress alone, though it was red,
and carried the room like fire carries light.
Not for the beauty of the face alone,
though it was gentle, and proud, and true.
But for the smile,
the first I saw,
that held no vanity,
no asking,
no disguise.
It came like rain to thirsty ground,
quiet, unbidden, and remembered.
Since then I have wished one thing:
not to stand afar as a passerby,
not to be lost in the drift of strangers,
but to be near,
to be counted on,
to be the voice that answers
when your night turns heavy.
Take this as my beginning,
a word instead of a rose.
If you will have it,
let it open slowly,
like trust,
like morning.
@okelododdychitchats
We Met Again
I saw her again,
the girl I once loved.
Time had touched her kindly.
She wore a white dress, soft as a prayer,
and it clung to her form
like the wind belongs to the sea.
She was lovelier than I remembered,
not just in face,
but in the quiet grace she carried.
Clean. Still.
Like a page I might’ve turned too soon.
The dress, white as chapel vows,
did justice to every curve,
each one a line in the poem I once left unfinished.
She smiled,
not bitter, not bold, just enough
to stir something old in me.
She said I looked different too,
more like the man she always pictured beside her.
Stronger, quieter, maybe even kinder.
And for a moment,
in the gentle silence between us,
I think we both wondered,
not with regret,
but with a wistful sort of hope,
if the pages we wrote apart
could still make sense together.
@okelododdychitchats
A Rose for You, My Love
The red rose sings of wild fire,
The white one breathes like the sea,
One burns with untamed longing,
One rests in serenity.
But I bring you a soft blush petal,
Not white, not crimson bright,
It holds the warmth of sunrise
And the still of falling night.
For love is not just quiet,
Nor only made to burn,
It’s the tender pull of yearning
And the joy when you return.
So here, my love, this rosebud,
It’s not bold, but it is true.
It blooms with gentle longing,
Like the way I bloom for you.
@okelododdychitchats
I Miss You More
I feel it everywhere.
In the quiet moments,
in the places you used to sit,
in the way the air feels a little heavier
without your presence in it.
There’s a space,
not loud or dramatic,
just a soft kind of empty
that follows me around.
I try to fill it with noise,
with work, with words,
but nothing really fits.
Because it’s you that’s missing.
I don’t just miss you in the big ways,
I miss the small things too.
The glance. The laugh. The comfort.
And somehow,
I just keep missing you more.
@okelododdychitchats
okelododdychitchats 