NAIJA BLOG

 I never knew of hugs or bosoms of comfort I never felt your hands caressing my strong kinky hair But I knew of your words Unkind and cruel that haunted me like a ghost I knew I was ugly and was not much I knew I would find the home in chaos with screams and pain in my eyes and in my soul I knew I never had a home so I would search forever for one Mother Dearest now you try to hug me when we meet but I never knew how it felt to hug you and I cannot do that now Now you wish to laugh and talk with me but mother your words and your deeds belie your nonsense chatter you are the pain that seeks the multitude in my destruction like the two-faced Janus  I can never trust I sought you when I came of age away and safe from your rage to find out why But you would not tell me why a girl  could not find safety in her mother's arms when I sought your face from the turbulent storms, you laughed in delight for you thought  my end was near Now you hobble in age and you pray  for all will be well w

I hide myself now From prying eyes and talking lips Hearts that have brought me sorrows Souls that have brought me no respite You weary me, friend finders Lovers seekers I have no answers for your internal quest Your minds are stagnated in the loop of want and desire Your thoughts dwell on the mortal And weary me I shield myself from you as I search within For questions and the answers and hopes and dreams And await ephiphany Years have been lost In your furtive eyes Your hollow speech Your descent into mortality Your cheap desires I shield myself from you

 Aunty Jummai's house in GRA Was heaven to me It smelled of vanilla cake Frostind and fried flour dough You could be sure of cold kunun zaki And a thousand and one delights It held a trove of treasures, where we read And read and played and ate Aunty Jummai's house in GRA was one of delightful memories that brings to me a smile on my face and the fragrance of childhood to my nose. 

 They were the prize they said But I saw as a child How they discarded those they unwanted Pretty Toyin with her permed hair Crying over the aged bachelor in her boys quarter Beautiful Maryam The newscaster who was a corper Who had her things thrown out in the streets of Bolori They were the prize they said And held the power over tears And happiness Over self Leaving a string of sorrow and sadness Of pursuit and conquer Of lust and desire The prize of chaos

 There  we fell In the midst of their drama The desperate one  And the mischievous one Despair in her eyes Mischief and despair in his eyes We were the threats she screamed at him Pleading for love He laughed like one stuck  In a Sisyphean loop of infinite games We weren't ready for that We were there for the Mr. Biggs Burgers And not the Shakeperean tragedy But I learnt also Never to plead for love

 You could not wait To devour me,  Mr. Death Come and meet me At the hotel you said You drooled and drooled And I looked like a fool I lied and say yes I would see you and you smiled And waited but not for me For your death I saw your death Staring at me through the walls Of your temporary kingdom Aghast I said... I knew this man, met him once.  Pray, what killed him To which someone replied "Woman na im kill am" I prayed and thanked heaven for sparing Me from a painful death Or a painful life.

 I gave it to you,  Raw and red, broken and torn For it was so hard to find someone who  Liked chess And talked books You laughed at it Mocked at it "I was sowing where I didn't reap" I waited for you To see beyond the glare of the eyes And the words that spoke vile and bike But you were the words  And you were the bile And you were bile So I took it back, broken and torn And soothed it up with the balm of words and deeds and the breeze of life And I forgot your words And your eyes And I loved and I showed what I reap Adieu bitter one,  Life is mine as well

 She won Even in her loss she won So you remain stuck In an undefeatable battle For a heart that will never be yours  You measure your success with her tears You compete with one who no longer plays the game He is lost because she was  His heart.  When she left, he died When you left, he lived She won, even in her defeat and shame She won

 There he presides over an assembly of fools who drink his every word, the gullible naive the charlatan was as smart as a fox and as sly as a snake who feeds on emotions like a vampire to twist and turn all within his reach. Wwhat a lovely god he has become at the height of his power, he made the Force shake at the edge of his power, they shake not at their knees but in their teeth waiting for the time to end his reign the truth is a rejected mistress and admists the lies the mistress shows up from time to time and the charlatan drowns her in a torrent of words she remains a figure behind the noise and the discerning see the  dead boys who still seek justice the missing child of a disabled mother the missing funds donated to the poor the defiant mother and tenebrous daughter Mister, lady truth seeks behind you heavily like a mist in the cloud  waiting to pour  she will not be killed or destroyed so she lays heavily on your chest at night and ages your cheeks and bothers your sleep you

 They were from another era with their failing faces and morbid bodies so we ignored them because they had nothing to tell us that would interest us The old were monsters we detested and avoided and they wanted us because our eyes held something they had lost they wanted our thin waists, our courageous   smiles our defiant eyes that did not beg them or want them But we chose a few of the old  the ones we liked that were not stained by life the ones who taught us the ones who looked good  the rest we avoided  the ones that sat heavily in their government chairs hiding government files the ones who sat in restaurants lonely and waiting the ones who moved silently waiting for those long gone the ones who tried to revive the lost years Now we move heavily  and we have have the same wistfulness in our eyes now our eyes are sad and searching  reaching out for an identity in the eyes of the young now our voices and silent and forgotten now we are avoided Now we are old.  

 Bring back those days of old Indian music and indian films  where we sat poor and hunched at the mercy of the houses that would host us while we watched  Bollywood movies where we would walk for miles and our smiles were easy unbothered about the future and lived in the moments Bring back those days when we were not cautious  of words being twisted and eyes being hostile and we would run for miles because we could  and we never bothered about being loved  or unloved about aging and failing of wealth and demands Those days when we were truly happy and free