When The Bell Calls
Poems exploring repetition and quiet systems of control within institutional and domestic spaces, reflecting on how routine, environment, and memory shape human behaviour — from Oluwatobi Adeboyeku
When The Bell Calls
A poem about a bell, and the quiet making of obedience
Some mornings started with a bell.
Sometimes a bell, sometimes that sharp
electric cry —
either way, it found us before we were ready.
Sleep thinned at the edges.
Someone always muttered,
“They have started again,”
like it had ever stopped.
We opened one eye, closed it again,
tried our luck.
It never worked.
Across the room, someone tugged a net away,
another held on to their pillow,
someone whispered,
“Wake me when it stops.”
It never stopped.
So, we got up.
Not together, not neatly — just bodies
moving into the morning.
The corridor felt already occupied
before we stepped into it.
We learnt the rhythm quickly: start, stop, move, sit.
Until we stopped noticing we were learning at all.
Somewhere in that repetition,
the bell stopped sounding like a sound
and started sounding like an instruction we had already obeyed.
Break came and opened everything briefly —
then folded it back again.
Even silence began to arrive on schedule.
And somewhere beyond us, the bell rested —
not because it was tired,
but because it knew we would wake again
without needing to be called.
The House That Leanred in Silence
A poem about silence, and how a house slowly learned to keep it
The house learnt my silence before it learnt my name.
It adjusted itself around me —
doors closing more softly,
floors forgetting how to complain.
At first, I thought it was space.
But emptiness makes noise when you listen long enough.
The walls kept their distance politely.
Even the clock reduced its ambition,
ticking, as if it did not want to be noticed.
I began to speak less without deciding to.
My voice arrived late to sentences,
then stopped coming on some days.
Outside, life continued practising itself.
Cars passed as if they had somewhere important to be.
People called out names that no longer reached me.
Inside, I learnt the difference between stillness and waiting.
Stillness does not expect anything.
Waiting always does.
The house did not react to my absence of sound,
only reorganised it.
One evening, I dropped a glass.
It broke with unnecessary honesty.
I remember thinking how loud truth becomes
when it is no longer contained.
After that, I became more careful with my movements,
as if the house was paying attention
without needing to look.
Now the rooms feel slightly more patient than I am.
They hold my presence even when I forget myself.
They do not ask questions.
They only remember.
And sometimes, when I drift too far into myself,
I think the house almost answers back —
not in words,
but in the way it stays exactly as it is
when I am not looking —
and still holds me anyway.
Oluwatobi Adeboyeku is a Nigerian published author of two fiction novellas, The Thing That Came Between Us and Echoes from Yesterday. Her work is forthcoming in Kalahari Review and others. She is a poet, audiobook narrator, playwright, and essayist, writing across multiple genres including fiction, poetry, drama, and essays.
In addition to her creative work, she is a business analyst with a master’s degree in business analysis from Manchester Metropolitan University, United Kingdom, and a master’s degree in human resource management from Coventry University, United Kingdom. She also holds a Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in English Language.
Her writing often explores everyday experiences and human interactions, capturing familiar moments and subtle insights from African life. Through her work, she reflects the richness of culture, humor, and the complexities of human relationships, making her stories both relatable and thought-provoking.
