Grief

Hafeedhoh, I was dancing when I learned of your death; may my feet be severed from my body

My dear Hafeedhoh,

You and I know that I have always been the one writing about death, about suicide, about the several uncompleted stories I would leave behind if all of a sudden I were to slump and die. I have often perceived – as a panther perceives its prey from afar – the stench of death hanging in the air around me, thick and acrid and stubborn. And sometimes I only feel it as a breeze, seeping into the pores of my skin, making my hair stand erect like bristles. And, sometimes, I feel death like the rushing of a mighty wind. Whichever way nevertheless, I am clearly the one waiting for death. I had written beautifully about it, sent it to our class WhatsApp group, which you read, which you reacted to in my DM. You said: Be strong. And really I took to your words and was. That was only a few months ago.

Dear Hafeedhoh, while all I write about is death, you, differently, have always been the one writing about being strong in the face of life hazards, in the face of adversity. You write about pain with a passion and precision only personal encounters could summon. For many weeks I keep reading your works as you send them to our class WhatsApp group, one after another. And soon I begin to add a little comment, plus the love emoji, the kisses emoji. Sometimes I quote your lines, to put forth to you the parts that strike me most. You would look at my comment and smile, and reply with a lame but appreciative emoji. I know then that you’re a reserved person, although I couldn’t figure out why you are so reserved. Out of curiosity I have texted you privately: Hi, I am Cerebral.

I am traveling home on that day to see my family. I am sitting in a bus outside the university gate when I text you for the first time. I want to learn how to write like you, I lie. (Actually, I just want to know you, get close to you.) You view my texts, log out for a long time, then return with loads of messages. You ask me: Do you keep a diary? Because keeping a diary is one of the first keys to writing well... If you don’t mind, write to me everything you’ve done today. I say: OK, I don’t mind, and quickly set about the business of writing everything I have done that day. (Right now Hafeedhoh, as I write this, the time is eight forty-nine p.m. My battery power is eight percent, and my mobile network is off, on flight mode. I am in a car, an old station wagon I boarded at Osogbo; I am on my way home again, to see my family at Ogbomoso, in Oyo State. Is it a coincidence, writing to you the first and last time on my way home? It is earlier today, in the afternoon, immediately after Philosophy class, that I login on WhatsApp and see Karimah’s message on our group page, the one that tells us all that you have passed away. I am in this car and thinking about passing away, too.)

By and by, dear Hafeedhoh, we become friends – chat buddies; we get talking. We save each other’s contact and start to view each other’s status, read each other’s works, exchange helpful commentaries. I don’t post my pictures, I rarely do, because I am operating under cover on our class WhatsApp group, under the false Cerebral identity. But you do post your own pictures, in a reasonable way though. You would put up your picture and add a short caption, a short but touching caption about pain, or fear, or beauty, or strength. Your message, I come to realise, is the same, which is encapsulated in the words: Be strong, even when you are falling apart in the face of adversity. And, really, you are strong in the face of adverse conditions. Yes. You are.

I like to view your pictures. I dutifully spend time on them, admiring and reading the captions, and at the same time wondering what kind of person you really are behind that veil of yours. I am crucial for details; there is hardly anything that passes my eyes unnoticed. It is on one of these days that you post a picture of yourself sitting inside your bedroom, with a desk cramped with books in the background, peeking above your shoulder. I send you the yellow moon emoji and say: So, what books are behind this Shana’s back now oh? Are they novels? You reply: Lol. They are class materials. EGL. LIT. I have been home-ridden for a long time now, since after matric, studying alone. You can’t understand what I am passing through. Although, actually, I already sensed what you are passing through. I could feel it. In a private conversation between us Gallant has hinted it before, glossing over your predicament in a few words. So I say, a little too quickly: Hmmm. Be strong, Hafeedhoh, even when you are falling apart in the face of adversity. I am not sure whether cutting you off with that quote, that rebuttal, is right, whether there is something important you want to tell me, that you want me to listen to, that you probably have not told anyone else. But I cut you off, because I don’t want to listen to your problems – nobody wants to listen to another’s problems. And now I think I am stupidly wrong. I should have just listened.

In the car, as we speed on, I unlock my smartphone, open my Moon Reader app, and read a poem titled ‘Grief’, written by American poet Stephen Dobyns. It says:

Trying to remember you

is like carrying water

in my hands a long distance

across sand. Somewhere

people are waiting.

They have drunk nothing for days.

Your name was the food I lived on;

now my mouth is full of dirt and ash.

To say your name was to be surrounded

by feathers and silk; now, reaching out,

I touch glass and barbed wire.

Your name was the thread connecting my life;

now I am fragments on a tailor’s floor.

I was dancing when I

learned of your death; may

my feet be severed from my body.

I reread the last three lines again and again and, as much as I have tried against letting it happen, a tear slides down my cheek. I have promised myself not to cry. I am a man, I have said to myself. I have cried before, I shouldn’t cry again. But right now the tears are running freely down my cheeks, down my neck, soaking into my shirt. I can’t help it, just as most people can’t help it, too. Joke (Humeeh) must be the only one I know who has cried the ocean for you. Her eyes are red, like the stem of a rose flower that has just been cut and is beginning to heal there.

I remember sending you a link. It takes me a long time to find it. It is for an article written by Chimamanda Adichie. It tells the story of her struggle with depression. She has sent it out to Guardian magazine for publication, but later withdraws it. Then, one day, sometime in 2015, it is unofficially published. You tell me that you are going through spells of depression, that you are in low spirits. You promise to read it. I do not wait to receive your reply, to know whether or not you have read it, before I delete my WhatsApp account and clear our chats. I do that without informing you beforehand. For this I am deeply sorry.

At that time I am beginning to plan a creative writing competition on WhatsApp. It would take place on our class page. It is not really a competition as is the case of competitions, it is just an avenue for us to write our best pieces and showcase our talents as writers. I have sent messages to almost everyone of our classmates who writes: You, Elkanah, Dolapo, Alowoeshin, Owiwi Shrieks, Pythagoras, Som, Ebenezer, Jeff Miller, Jesus Pet... The plan is to have a whole week to ourselves on the Class of Titans group, a week in which we would post a number of works per day, that our classmates will read and comment on. You tell me to talk to our class reps. I do. I am able to talk to Gallant, who says OK and gives his affirmative consent right on the spot. That is in the first weeks of first semester 200 level. In these weeks things appear to be fine with me, personally. Then, one day, without predetermining it – because I want to run away from people and be alone (like the metaphysical poets!), because I want all the Cerebral identity to stop – I delete my WhatsApp account and lost every trace of your memory. Today, after I hear that you have passed away, I browse through the thousands of pictures in my gallery to find a single photo of yours that I have, a single photo from past times, not the one that has just been uploaded, not this one that seems to have been the only picture you have ever taken in your life. I even check the pictures on the memory card I have stopped using. I can’t find you. I can’t find even a trace of you. Not even your phone number. I am sorry. I am so sorry.

I tell you about my personal life. I don’t know you but I tell you nonetheless. You are wise, wiser beyond your years. There have passed between us a lot of talk, so much that now it shocks me to know how much I’ve told you, how much of me you have taken to heaven. You are the first person to ask me: Wait, are you homosexual? I remember what leads to that question. It is a very emotional but funny talk between us. I don’t want to talk about it here. No one will know about what we talk about, we promise each other. In fact, when school resumes (we are on that awful SER break as at the time we start talking) we will not look around for each other. I will not ask anybody, ‘Please, do you know a girl called Hafeedhoh?’ And you will not ask anybody, ‘Excuse me, do you know that guy called Cerebral?’

The first time I see you you are sitting on the long bench on the ground floor of Humanities Building III, at that corridor that leads to the entrance of AUD I; opposite you is the mural of Achebe and Soyinka. You are in tight jeans and a black, flowing garment. Your hair is loosely covered with a black scarf that winds around your neck. You look healthy, healthier than in the pictures I used to see on your status and, briefly, as brief as a second, my eyes peruse your body proportions. You are beautiful; you are fine. I do not need anybody to tell me that this is you, this is Hafeedhoh, this is that poet! Joke is with you, hugging you as though her life depends on you. Muhammed is with you, too. I am standing aloof with my friend, Som – I am always with Som – the reason why you ask whether I am homosexual – and then I nod at you, cocking my head a bit, as I say to Som (who himself is a poet): That is Hafeedhoh, the one who posts poems on the group page. He looks across at you, nods back and says, Oh.

There is this particular day. It is afternoon. Everybody is seated inside ODLT I, waiting for lecture to commence. I come in and see you sitting towards the back of the classroom. And, for a brief moment, our eyes meet. I understand immediately that someone has pointed me out, that one way or another our promise to each other has been broken. I find myself a seat, and I keep looking at you through the lecture, catching your eye again and again. I do not walk up to you and you do not walk up to me. You are the friend I do not meet until death comes and takes away.

Hafeedhoh, I know you are gone, even though Joke keeps pacing the Humanities corridor fretting and telling me she doesn’t believe it yet, even though she keeps posting on her WhatsApp status that you should come back, must come back! Hafeedhoh, you have crossed into the Beyond. Many people have wept for you. You are on almost everybody’s WhatsApp status – excluding mine, because I can’t withstand viewing your picture over and again as my viewers increase, arousing a sadness I am struggling to cement in the basement of my heart. Many still can’t believe you’ve gone, many don’t even know you. Many want you to come back. I don’t know whether I want you to come back. This life has been tough, after all. Maybe it is your time. We don’t always know our time until we are caught in the nest. We will all die, now or later. The best thing is to live every moment at its best, in line with God’s plan. But then, how do we walk in His plan if we know Him not!

Ijeoma has posted on her status: The thing is – we will move on, the hurt will fade. We’ll just preserve all the memories we can, while wishing we did more.

I wish I did more, Hafeedhoh. I awfully wish.

Rest on, dear. Rest on. 💔