Achala Ugo
Jonathan Chibuike Ukah
How I turned wild with gladness
when I watched your almond eyes,
staring into space like a sky being,
is one of the wonders of the modern world.
For I was a man with no ordinary hunger,
no thirst and appetite for lukewarm.
Soft, tender beauty didn’t entice my heart,
nor have I thought of being entertained,
by a woman blessed with an exquisite glow.
Glamour is extinct; gorgeous is unappetizing,
the thing that excites me is an embarrassment
to the sacred delicacies of creation,
a fruit juicier than a feather’s tenderness,
tastier than the morning songs of birds
when they wake up from a long sleep,
in which I lose the strength to resist
the troubled taste of tomorrow's turmeric.
I think of Helen of Troy, of Aphrodite;
perhaps you’re the perfect golden ratio,
a hundred per cent of divine feasting,
that the most beautiful woman in the world
has no extraordinary means of attaining.
How do I begin to chew divine pineapples,
as though your body grew like a sweet fruit;
how do I compare you to a tender Turkey,
when you are glory’s model, the aroma of me?
In body, you are fresh like the air I breathe;
in spirit, you are fish in the sea I drink.
I saw white wood turn to cream chocolate,
red peas have morphed into green avocados;
I watched the sun’s purple sharp rays,
cringe and became a flavoured orange juice
which no man can stare at and be still.
Love that is yet an infant has grown teeth,
as chickens without the possibility of sharpness
borrowed money to sharpen their tongues.
But you, Achala Ugo, are the food I eat,
where I punch my stomach, where I belch out;
my head will not hit the stone of Sheol,
nor will my eyes suffer the sins of shame,
but the grace of your presence is satisfaction;
where you command the storms in my soul
and every hunger and wrangling stops.
Everything within me hears your cooking,
like the clouds that hear the smoke of the sky,
the leaves that hear the sweet aroma of trees;
the rivers feel the tamarind of the shores;
and the mountains hear the flavors of thyme.
You possess my body, my heart and my soul,
and I love you with love in every word and chord.
Jonathan Chibuike Ukah
Jonathan Chibuike Ukah is a Pushcart-nominated poet living in the United Kingdom. His poems have been featured in Pangyrus Lit, The Pierian, Propel Magazine, Atticus Review, The Journal of Undiscovered Poets and elsewhere. He won the third Prize in the Voices of Lincoln Poetry Contest in 2024 and the Alexander Pope Poetry Award in 2023. He was the Editor’s Choice Prize Winner of Unleash Lit in 2024. He was the Second Poetry Prize Winner at the Streetlights Poetry Prize in 2024 and Winner of the Poet of the Month December-January 2025 at the Literary Shark Poetry Contest.