Dear reader,
This magazine began at a graveside.
Earlier this year my father died. He had been ill for a long time under the wrong diagnosis, and the right one came only twelve days before he was gone. He was one of the strongest men I have known, in spirit, mind and heart, and one day I will write about him properly. But I know where he is. To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord, and where he has gone is far more beautiful than where we are. That hope gave my grief a different shape. It did not make this life small enough to ignore. It made it a gift to steward, one we will give account for to God. So why wait? We should live it now, the way He wants it lived, with what He has already put in our hands. Onkọ̀wé is what that grief walked into.
I will be honest with you: I hate death, and I hate sickness. They are thieves. But the question is not whether we have time. The question is what we will do with the time we have.
My answer was this: do it with what you have. Not with what you wish you had, or what you will have someday. One step at a time, with the hands and the words in front of you.
So we opened the doors and asked for stories. Writers sent us their work, and we read every piece with care. We did not polish them into perfection. We wanted them true. What you will find in these pages is love in its many shapes: love that waits, love that fights, love that frightens, love that outlives the people who held it.
Onkọ̀wé is Yoruba for the writer. We believe stories are the way we orient ourselves in reality. Onkọ̀wé is here to remind you that you are still alive in this world, and to show you how others have lived and loved, so that you can find your own bearings.
So live now. Love now. Read slowly.
Welcome to ịhụnanya, our first issue, and the beginning of many beautiful things.
Immanuel Dámilárè Olúwànífísẹ́Managing Writer & Editor