Ambrose Musiyiwa

Ambrose Musiyiwa is the author of the poetry pamphlet, The Gospel According to Bobba. He co-edited Welcome to Leicester (Dahlia Publishing, 2016), an anthology that explores the story of Leicester through poetry. His poems have been featured in poetry anthologies that include Over Land, Over Sea: Poems for Those Seeking Refuge (Five Leaves Publications, 2015), Do Something (Factor Fiction, 2016), and Write to be Counted (The Book Mill, 2017).

Featured below are two creative pieces by Ambrose.


Job Centre

viewed from Lee Street,
the Job Centre 
is a place of scars,
broken things

and exits to nowhere



Batman is a joker

You take a friend to the train station and then walk home on your own. You have a backpack. In it are cameras, batteries and a laptop. The night smells of autumn spreading a duvet. The backpack is heavy.

You get home, put the kettle on, make a cup of coffee, sit down, and your phone rings. Your mom wants to know if you are OK.

You say you are alive and well and really, really happy. And you tell her about the wonderful people who have been in and out of various parts of your day.

She says she is happy you are happy. Even over the phone, you can hear the relief in her voice.

You ask her if she is OK. She says she is fine.

You ask her what's wrong.

She is silent.

Then she sighs.

She has woken up from a dream in which Batman is a joker and joker Batman is a woman on a bicycle with a balaclava she wears like a beenie hat. Her cycling gear is a bullet-proof bomb-proof get up that makes her look like a Missy Elliot impersonator.

I give you to the city, mother says. In the same way you gave yourself to the city, I give you to the city.

The line breaks. You try to call her back many times. You cannot get through. You stop trying because the line is like that. Sometimes it is there. And sometimes it is not there. The line has a will of its own.


You are tired.