Defenestrationism.net

by Ibrahim Abdulhakeem

I. The Fence Builders
posting December 30th
II. The Market Choir
posting December 31st
III. The Night School
posting January 1st
IV. When We Danced the Street Awake
posting January 2nd

I. The Fence Builders

They came at dawn with buckets and nails. The fence was to divide the town neatly—east from west, us from them. It was meant to stop the noise, the gossip, the drifting smells of burnt oil and roasted corn. But the builders were our sons and daughters, so we brought them water and bread.

I remember Tunde hammering the first post, saying, “We just follow plans.” Someone answered, “Whose plans?” Nobody replied. By noon the sun cooked the tin sheets. By evening, the fence shimmered like a blade in the sky.

Children slipped through holes to trade marbles. Mothers passed bowls of soup under the panels. The fence didn’t stop much—just reminded us to pretend.

When the wind tore the panels loose that first harmattan, we didn’t rebuild. We stood together watching the pieces dance off into the dust, free as if the land itself had rejected our separation. Tunde laughed, “Guess the fence knew better.” We laughed too, a choir of tired throats, the sound of walls collapsing gently.

—

II. The Market Choir

On Fridays, the market sang.

Not like a choir with robes and rhythm, but with hundreds of untrained voices—price calls, gossip, goats complaining.

Mama Bisi always started it. She’d shout, “Tomato sweet pass last week o!” and someone else would respond with, “Na lie! Last week one dey red like sin!” The rest of us joined the chorus.

A stranger came one day—earphones, sunglasses, silence. He flinched at every shout, every laughter-crack. I sold him oranges, and he whispered “Too loud here.” I said, “That’s how we speak joy.”

He left before noon.

But that evening, he came back with a small recorder. “Can I—listen again?”

He spent three days with us, gathering sound. Two weeks later, a radio played our market’s voice across the state. We heard ourselves laughing, bargaining, living. It was ugly and glorious.

When the program ended, we stood still, letting our own echoes fade. The stranger had captured something fragile and returned it to us—our noise, our proof of being.

—

III. The Night School

We gathered in an unfinished mosque, roofless but holy enough. Lantern light painted faces gold. Aunty Sade taught us English letters, tracing each one in the sand. Some of us were old enough to be her fathers, but she called us “my children” and we obeyed.

“C is for community,” she said one night.

“What’s that?” someone asked.

She smiled. “The reason you’re all here together instead of sleeping.”

We practiced writing community until the sand became smooth with repetition. Outside, motorbikes coughed and died; the stars leaned in to watch. When the rain came suddenly, we covered our books with our bodies. Ink bled through the pages, but we didn’t run. Rain on skin felt like an exam we could all pass together.

Afterward, she looked at our drenched notebooks and said, “You’ve already learned it—the word is not on paper, it’s here.”

She tapped her chest. We nodded, shivering, illuminated by thunder.

—

IV. When We Danced the Street Awake

The blackout had lasted six days. We’d forgotten what music sounded like through speakers. So we made our own.

First came Jide with his talking drum, then the twins with broken pots, then Halima with a whistle carved from bamboo. The rhythm rose, messy and alive. People poured from their houses, waving candles and phone lights. Even the pastor joined with his tambourine, and the imam clapped time beside him. Children leapt through the smoke of mosquito coils.

Someone shouted, “We are the light!”

And for a moment, it was true.

The street glowed—not from bulbs, but from us. Faces gleamed, sweat and faith mixed. When the power finally blinked back on, the bulbs looked pale compared to our fire.

We didn’t stop.

We danced until dawn, until the city’s silence bowed to our heartbeat.

When the drums ended, and the whistle died, we stood panting and smiling at one another.

Community, we learned, is not built. It’s remembered.

And that night, we remembered.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 30th, 2025 at 9:20 am and is filed under !What's New!. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.