201020

A boy stared with sightless eyes at the starless sky

The smile across his neck would be pretty if it wasn’t bloodshot…

Like one of the many bristles of the brush, his head held ink, dark and red, ready to paint you a picture.

Of what dead hopes taste like on the tongue of hearts tired from trying

Just this morning his eyes held a song,
His knees said a prayer.

Someone lied to him, said there was salvation in the dead fingers of a nation’s anthem.
Told him to keep faith in the green-white-green textile

He came out with a song, just this morning…

So now the boy gazes.
Undead eyes pregnant with horror.

There are missing pages in his story. Hungers never spoken.

And today, we offer paltry libations of honor, to the heroes whose mangled bodies paint our history.

St.Davnique™️
©2021

WE, THE INDEPENDENT ONES

We are they that ride on the waves,
Of ideas, beautiful manifestos of the 50s,
The very spittle that our mother told us if dried before the 60s,
Our navels would rot,

We are the child born in lies,
A fatherless child of 250 fathers,
A child that reminds our mother of this rape called amalgamation,
The child who is half of everything,
Whose strength should be in being everything,
Yet one thing rules: the cancer of corruption,

We are this child in dependence,
To the blind, senseless man that knew how we were delivered from,
This very deep inferno between our mother’s leg,
We encourage ourselves with hopes in things,
Things our reality tells us can never be,
We are married to Religion,
These new Masters that promise us mansions and virgins when we,
Like the worms, cringe and bow out of this stage,

We are hungry,
Milk and honey we dare not wish for,
Our elder brothers eat honey,
They told us to pray,
If we dared stared too long into his plate, he would slay,
The nascent dream we have,

We are independent,
Masters of our own,
Slaves to our elder brothers,
Who constantly tell us that the rudders will be ours one day,
Yet make their sons our master when,
Need be…..
Happy Independence Day.

Chukwu Simeon Chidiebere
© 2018