Olatunde Osinaike
YES TO THE HUSTLE
To the outrageous,
the proven
parachute.
My best,
a memory
someone promised me
I could live in,
until
it became
a partnership
suiting
no one.
Wait
what was
their name?
Mere game,
a premise
of corners
cutting
those closest.
In my circles,
we round
up
to the price
it takes
to blank our
bridges.
Omniscience,
need I remind you,
is for the feisty
who supply supply
its demanding
riddle. Me,
this inflatable
of a man
muttering belief
you could work
a dream
with benefits.
Take it from me
like autopay,
like a transaction
I’ll have
screenshots of
to keep me
company.
OLATUNDE OSINAIKE is a Nigerian-American poet, essayist, and software developer originally from the West Side of Chicago. He is the author of Tender Headed (Akashic Books, 2023), winner of the 2022 National Poetry Series. His work has received support from Poets & Writers, the Hurston/Wright Foundation, the Kenyon Review Writers Workshop, and the Institute for the Study of Global Racial Justice at Rutgers University. He lives in Atlanta.
ISSUE FOURTEEN features poetry by Austin Araujo, Rae Armantrout, Aaron Baker, David Baker, Cal Bedient, John Berryman, Daniel Borzutzky, Izzy Casey, Colby Cotton, Cortney Lamar Charleston, Yongyu Chen, William Virgil Davis, Maggie Dietz, Kirsten Kaschock, David Kirby, Virginia Konchan, Timothy Liu, Airea D. Matthews, Ted Mathys, Erika Meitner, Olatunde Osinaike, Mary Ruefle, Natalie Shapero, Jordan Stempleman, and Matthew Tuckner; fiction by Tyler Barton, Elizabeth Hart Bergstrom, Tom Howard, and John Dermot Woods; nonfiction by Emmeline Clein, Aryn Kyle, David Stuart MacLean, and Justin Quarry; and Airea D. Matthews in conversation with Devon Walker-Figueroa.