Maame Abena Obenewaa Yeboah

Love no longer brews in the African pot.
It steams and stirs up from places we are unsure of.
Its reliability and sustainability are no longer measured by the flames it can hold.
Love now leans towards the exterior and the aesthetic.
Casual hellos, welcome homes, and have-a-nice-days simmer it all.

Beeep! There, the motorist door slid apart—either opened from within or outside.
And shuush—it was always just Jojo and me, strapped within the four corners of the elevator.
If reality could strip us bare, what we had felt too good to be smooth.

So when Jojo leaned toward me, his voice soft-spoken and dazzling as always,
I wasn’t sure if the bubbling lump in my chest came from within me or from the charm in his tone—
though his flattery sounded like hush waters in my ears.
I stared at him.
“Dine and wine at my end tonight?” he asked.

I wanted to say fine, but instead, my hand gently reached out
and pressed the hard-surfaced control panel.
The third-floor button felt cold, yet bold in its numerals.

“Nanaa,” Jojo whispered, pulling the name from the depths of his soul.
I stared at him with intensity and swayed out of the elevator.
The setting felt too familiar in the way my heart raced.
Everything mirrored the kinds of doors I had encountered before.

I looked at the two arrows facing each other—and I pushed.
“Nanaa,” he coaxed again, “just for tonight.”

I peered into his face as if I were searching for long answers.
But instead of a response, the words quietly crept out of my mouth:
Nada de eso otra vez!