To my sister Oddiri

Oddiri, ah Oddiri my sister!
The tears rain from my lachrymal glands
Evil has beset us greatly
And the good old days are lost so soon.
What world of innocence we did have,
Fantasy suffusing our hearts with joy,
Our future built on hopes,
As we saw a world that greatly needed us.
 
How we dreamt of journeys to Mars
Living like giants in a world we bettered
Those days of innocence,
When fantasy fired hope
And happiness was derived from dreams.
Those days, we watched cartoons
And lived like fairies in a fairyland.
What bliss we did have then,
As we had dreams of affluence and fame.
Passionately building hopeful castles
Discovered too soon to be built in the air.
 
Not that we didn’t work hard Oddiri,
But the world is wicked that we never knew.
Now harsh realities have stripped us of all we had
As we realize too late that,
Much more than bare ability leads to success here.
 
But Oddiri,our brothers had great plans
Blood was to be their brick.
Our shoulders are meant to bear.
The staggering weight of
Their mansion of misuse and misrule
Aha! Humans as pillars.
Pillars alone? No Oddiri
Others are meant to serve as carpets.
The more honoured are elevated,
To solid steps to the top of
This staggering tower of Babel
Which God seems to have forgotten.
 
Oddiri,
Here was paradise,
Honey flowed, milk sang
In the Niger River.
We saw them Oddiri, we tasted them too,
And it was communally shared
Then, who knew,
That milk can be canned?
Who knew, that honey can be prepared?
And together with the canned milk,
Sold and money stuffed,
Into the pockets of a few brothers?
 
Brothers?
The very sound of that word,
Makes me feel I have blasphemed!
Traitors, pushes harder to come out,
But I must hold it back.
Lest my head become an ornament
Flamboyantly displayed on a pole,
 A Shouting deterrent to others,
Audibly saying; “keep your mouths shut!”
That’s another one Oddiri.
You talk only when you are asked to.
And then, say the evils are…
I cannot ever say the word!
 
But you know sister,
That this is how it is,
With other lands we call developed.
Deep potholes are trademarks,
Of roads well constructed!
The days we had smooth roads,
Then we lived in hell.
This is heaven, heaven on earth. So drum!
Who says electricity must hold on uninterrupted?
Taking it and bringing it, shows people are at work!

Fuel scarcity only shows,
That we are thrifty
We do not waste things here,
We save them for our children.
If we use up all the fuel,
Which one will our children use tomorrow?
You say people suffer during this scarcity?
Is it not only the greedy ones that suffer?
The non-greedy ones manage the nothing,
Which they have.
 
You want me to say it, don’t you know?
This is Africa, where Kola is given
From the bottom of our hearts,
To influence service.
Although our forefathers gave kolas
To welcome and show appreciation
And not as a necessity for deliverance of service.
 
Hush! Oddiri let no one hear it,
They eliminate opposition here.
To sustain their bloody rule.
The schools are barren,
Of implements of production.
Teachers starved, left, as they are - hungry.
They are donkeys, mules of work.
If they protest,
Schools are shutdown
When they are tired of protesting,
They continue the sacrifices.

Tell me Oddiri, what does our big brother sacrifice?
Hush baby! We know it, but
Let the knowledge die with us!
 If the poor man is fed up,
Let him pick up his gun and go rob.
When you let the fool,
He turns the gun on a man poorer.
Violence reeks is it not only in the slums?

The poor are like hounds.
Locked up in a common pen.
Tearing up one another,
While in skyscrapers and posh cars,
Children of the same mother,
Sip champagne and set fire,
On the congested dog pens.
 
Ah! Oddiri, evil reigns here.
Tell me sister, is it true?
Did we ever have a good time?
Was there ever a time,
When all was good and well?
Wake me up with a slap Oddiri.
My memory fails me.
And like a man suffering from amnesia,
I begin to wonder;
Did our fathers ever live
A life of freedom and equality?
Is this our great land of Iduu
Where all was once good and everybody merry?
 

The Tragedy of Our Youth

Tragedy,
Our lives,
A constant malady.

Adversity Kayoos us,
Despite persistent struggles.
Innocent Otiins that we are.

The tragedy of,
Failed leaderships
Have squashed

A luxuriant existence,
In our land,
Overflowing with

Milk and Honey.

And if Mother Dies...

Today,
I can only shed tears.

I watch,
(and so do other millions)
As our Mother
Together with all she has,
Is being squeezed to death.

The greedy clamour,
For an extension,
To a perpetual  rule of a few,
Has become foghorn.
 
A negation of tenets,
Long approved by others,
From foreign lands.
(Not that they should lay the rules).

How can it be,
That despite widespread clamour,
That we breathe freely,
We are being axphyxiated,
With claims of representation,and rulership,
That can only mortify us?

Sourness has enveloped my mother.
The cry for justice drowned,
By the selfish acclamation of support.

Brothers!
Do we watch in silence?
Should Mother die?

But know,
Know that when Mother dies,
We have all died.