Children

My heart aches with unquestionable pain as I watch a child clean the wind screen of a taxi that was stuck in traffic beside me. The boy wore faded brown shorts and a stained, dirty yellow shirt. He held a clothe in one hand and a bottle of soapy water in the other.

The boy stretch out a thin hand for his reward  beads of sweat on his forehead. Standing under the hot, blazing Nigerian sun would not be easy.

"Get out of here!" The driver exclaimed in annoyance, the boy was not swayed. Instead he went to the next car and repeated the action.

The woman who sat in the back seat rolled down her window of the old bashed up mercedes benz. A single 20 niara dangle out her window. The boy eagerly snatched it and put it into the pocket of his dirty faded shorts.

My heart broke, I am a mother of three. Two girls and a boy but no matter how poor I was, I would never abuse my children in such a way.

I know he certainly didn't choose to turn out  this way, I know that little boy was meant to be in school around this time. He wasn't meant to be on the road hustling.

I heard a horn from the cars behind me, the cars were moving forward ahead of me. I did the same. I ignored the boy's desperate need for help. After all I am just another Nigerian and I wouldn't make a difference.

At first

All good things come to an end, at first they came to us. Empty promises burried in our hearts.

With dust in our eyes and empty rivers to drink.

We accepted them, believed them. We didn't know we were the lambs for they slaughter. We didnt know we were the sacrifice.

We stood together, we came as one. We tore them down and put our kind there.

For a while the harvests were unending and it was good.

Things changed, the oppressed became the oppressors. Selling us out for international gain.

Each time it gets worse and now we live in darkened house with no light and starve ourselfs to pay the rent.

This isnt what we wanted, this isn't what we fought for.

I had a dream as a child and I spread my dreams out open but they were trampled.

When will peace come?

When will this torment end? When will we finally see?

The ants are now eating their people and it destroys our nation from within.

Fear

I refuse to shiver, shake or lose ground.

I stand with the faith of millions weighted on my back.

I hold up a sign, they see me and try to move me.

Nigeria wake up!

They know that we are asleep, they fear because I am awake.

I take a step forward and I am alone, other fallen by the way.

Corruption hear my voice and tremble, change is coming.

My children are hungry, barons of incompetence.

Dipping your hand in honey as we grow thin and fade.

My old ones are not paid, after service we are left to the cruel world to fend for ourselves.

New textbooks, students cry. They want to learn, why hold back progress?

Terrorists now attack and distroy many lives and still Nigeria dreams.

Blood drenches and fills the portholes on the roads.

Darkness is all we have.

A new dawn is coming.

I shall stand through rain and storm a sign in my hands and my eyes awake.

I am awake and soon Nigeria will awaken with a loud roar.

Lost

As I come before you, I come as a shadow of a man I once knew.

I have changed and my mirror can no longer recognise me.

I am no longer who I was. My eyes were blinded and heart lost in desires.

I have not sinned against my morals yet because white and black are now grey.

I have not spoken the truth yet because I rather seal my lips.

Who am I?

I already question and doubt myself. I wasn't even sure if this was reality. If I had fallen from grace.

Who am I?

Will I continue to fade and forget who I once was?

Will I ever remember my name?