What is showing on the television tonight?
The problem of television
is in its inability
to tell stories without darkness.
A book will speak of light
as if it has touched its skin,
felt the small tremors
of liver failure
inside its drunken stagger
to the bed & all the disasters
it creates just to get there.
A television hungers
to show you how.
You must see.
Well I don't want to see
how the little man dies,
how the girl hiccups
because she is too full of tears.
Sometimes, a radio play
is even better.
You don't have to watch
the actress pretend
to smoke the cigarette.
You are allowed a bit
for your imagination.
Have you ever cried
to a book?
It takes imagination
a blink of an eye
to make that leap
from page to picture.
It is why the library
in Benin has a hole
in the roof & the cinemas
have air-conditioning.
