They’ll tell you to go, and you’d grudgingly accept. Maybe after hurting the ones closest to you, maybe after breaking your lover’s heart—you stare into their eyes and a monster reflects, maybe after realizing healing has nothing to do with the prescriptions. Tepidly, you admit you are bad for your own company. Sometimes, you can’t see you’re falling apart because you’ve been veiled by denial. Living is injurious; the world wounds us in ways we are blind to. At the temple for broken people, you sit in a ring trying to complete the circle of healing. First, they say their name, before calling out their demons. One after the other, there is an outpouring of ache. Being vulnerable is a pill, and you doubt if you have the stomach for this. The shrink nods in your direction, and you realize for the first time, to heal, is to be honest with your wounds.
Abu Ibrahim (IB) is a Nigerian poet. His debut poetry album “Music Has Failed Us” was considered for a Grammy nomination in 2022. His poetry has been published internationally, including in Nigeria, Canada, the US, and the UK. He has performed at prestigious events such as the Pa Gya Literary Festival in Ghana, the Lagos International Poetry Festival, the Lagos Book and Art Festival, the Quramo Festival of Words, and more. IB is the winner of the Ink Sweat & Tears Pick of the Month for July 2024, the 2024 Poetry Journal Prize winner, a recipient of the Lagos State University Debate Society Impact Maker award for storytelling, and the winner of the 2023 Port Harcourt Poetry Festival Poetry/Spoken Word Album of the Year.
Serotonin 