I saw you… the realities of our society
I saw you when dead to the world at dusk, clad in matching
attires of refuge worn for sedition stolen from those meant to protect from
theft – in Whiteman’s khaki of gray colour, your legs buried in socks whiter
than snow sheltered by a muddy black boot looking much heavier than your
enfeebled legs. Your hands fenced by vicious gloves of deceit with less
attractive façade but capable of reducing to dust an entire village. Taking a
nap on your hand was a rifle born of modern technology, loaded with enough
‘deaths,’ as much as could win a battle. In my dreams, I did saw you; saw your
face as it mails to me an epistle long enough to write a book.
Lack of food, shelter and clothing, which they say are the
core necessities of life, were the first line of your epistle. Protesting on
the same page with poverty was unemployment shadowed by illiteracy, fuelled by lack
of infrastructures and capped by the ineptitude of government. Lack of
employment had paved the way for poverty, which came like driving rain, washing
away your nobility and prestige as a man. Both unwelcomed guest paced you to
your new employers. Those affluent men of our society, who gave you possessions
including that rifle. Indoctrinating that you fight for yours – fight for your
right; or be consumed of indigence – but whether in reality you fight for your
right or theirs is a tale for another day.
You were also seen, though you had your face covered, that your
identity might be unknown. You and your cohorts, with whom you forcefully
deprive people of their hard earned chattels. Pointing to their foreheads the
death in your hands while demanding that they choose between material goods and
living. During the day, you were like other members of the society going about
your daily business though you have no business. However, immediately darkness succeeds
in putting the day’s light into hostage, particularly during witching hours,
you appear clad in attires that makes your identity obscure sailing from one
house to the other, leaving them desolate. Though your face was securely wrapped,
however, the mystery behind your unlawful behaviour continues to echo on the
street like a cacophonic carol song. The thunderous whispers of the poor,
hungry and desperate youth.
I thought I was awake when suddenly I saw you. Beautiful as
Aphrodite the goddess of beauty, having all you needed to be well-endowed. Dressed
to kill, to kill credulous men whose eyes could not resist the sight of a busty
brunette. Clad in garments that makes what should be secret an open secret, you
parade the red zone where you and other workers of the oldest profession await
the sneaky arrival of costumers – your style of using what you have to get what
you want. Appearing at three sites were your daily ritual. First the red-zone
where clients come to seek your service. Followed by the brothel room where
your clients give you the peanut with which you survive the following day but
not before impregnating you repeatedly. Lastly, the hospital bed where you
murder your unborn children.
I then woke up but
to the realities of a gloomy society beset with despair, anguish, hardship a
place where survival of the fittest have become the order of the day. A society
in which people are surviving today so they can be able to survive tomorrow, a
society plagued with unemployment, illiteracy and poverty. A society were you
have to work your fingers to the bone just to have enough to be broke, a
society that seems to be heading towards obliteration. Like a train with a
drunken driver, a society that is fast heading towards a rock. While our
leaders continue to scramble for power, wealth, influence among others, we are
left in the gorge of survival doing all we can to keep death few steps away.
Each navigation
through the pages of our history books lives one wondering if we were specially
created to enjoy misery, our grandfathers divulged to our fathers how our
streets were better during their days, and now our own fathers recount this
same sob story before us. Hopelessly, we shall live to continue the chant of
similar tales of woe. Although neither our problem nor its solution seems to be
obscure, as even the newest member of our society can vividly identify our
challenges and even go as far as recommend possible solution, however, our state
continues to go downhill as though there is no solution to our hitches.
After a careful
consideration of all that beset us as a nation, am left at the verge of
concluding that our condition is merely the hand of god at work, perhaps we are
accused with a veiled limit. However, toeing the line with the words of William
Ernest, we are the master of our fate, we are the captain of our soul, we are
the architect of our own misfortunes, we are the artist sketching the lines of
our own existence, we are the playwright penning the script of our tragedies.
Both young and old, educated or not, male and female, we collectively shape the
realities of our society and our society will never be what we so much desire
of it without our wilful permission. more poem here
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