They say drop the weight of what’s been —
but my arms are shaped like the load they’ve carried.
These same arms now reach toward tomorrow
curled as they are around yesterday’s shape.

This hollow in my palms — is it for holding
or the print of what has already slipped away.
And when I place that hollow in a stranger’s hand
which emptiness will he feel first — mine or his own.

Next man queues for what he’s owed,
his palm open, waiting. I pass him
not my rights but the shape of what was taken —
and we call this exchange living.

Emptiness has a finger too
and it finds the trigger before we do.
Is this the burial they meant — not the past
but our knowing which finger pulls,
whose hand the safety serves,
which neighbour inherits the hollow
when the gun passes palm to palm.

So when they say the past must die
I ask which death — the one behind,
the one still breathing in my palm,
or the one now breathing in yours.

John Chinaka Onyeche is a Nigerian writer based in Port Harcourt Rivers State and is a Best of Net and Pushcart nominee. His collection Time & Songs of the River Men was published in 2023.