First, find the cracks in His silence.
The spaces between thunderclaps,
This is where He keeps His secrets,
where the prayers He ignored
curl up like dead leaves.
Next, gather the evidence.
The famine that starved your mother’s village,
the flood that swallowed your brother whole.
The fire He sent but didn’t extinguish.
Carry them like scars,
polished and sharp,
each one a dagger
pressed to His omnipotence.
Smear it on His face.
Learn the art of negotiation.
Kneel, but not in surrender.
Cry, but not for mercy.
Let Him taste the salt of your grief,
let Him see the fury
rising like smoke from your clenched fists.
Tell Him you’ve memorised the ways
He failed you. How can you forget?
Do not ask for heaven.
Do not ask for answers.
Demand the weight of His guilt.
Demand the stars He spilled across the sky
to light His own vanity.
Demand the voice He gave to prophets
but not to the broken.
Remind Him that He made you in His image—
and now you know
how to create darkness.
Hold your silence like a loaded gun.
Point it at the altar.
Point it at the sky.
Let Him see that you’ve learned
the art of withholding.
Then whisper your terms.
Not forgiveness.
Not redemption.
But this:
a world without hunger,
without fire,
without mothers burying their children
in soil that remembers nothing.
Tell Him He owes you.
Tell Him He always has.
And if He does not answer,
if He does not tremble
beneath the weight of your grief—
walk away.
Take His silence with you.
Turn it into a crown of thorns
and wear it like a king.
Felix Eshiet resorts to fiction and poetry as an incorruptible escape. He’s studying English at the University of Uyo and freelance-writes fiction in his spare. Felix is published on Fiery Scribe Review and elsewhere. He tweets at @gwriting_plug.
Cover image credit: Mesut Ylcn