POEM: THOUGH I AM DEAD

 A POEM: THOUGH I AM DEAD

Before I lay me down to rest, for one last time, I'd like to summon my arrow from its quiver.

Of my arrow (my pen), I desire to have a final grip even as my bones scourge from within & my breath bid me an unwanted farewell, slowly.

Even so, in agony, I give this last rendition.

This is the ill kismet I've been made to suffer for standing for a righteous course.

For breaking out of the hollow hell I'd been confined to by this treacherous leaders and for regurgitating the oppressive pills I'd been forcefully given to swallow via their monstrous claws:

As I lifted my Nation's (Nigeria) flag with her sacred anthem heavily resounding on my lips.

I saw bullets, in flames, Pierce through the flesh of my fellow innocuous youths. And like a movie, i watched lifeless bodies lay down in heaps!

Aghast! I chanted aloud our sacred anthem to be heard.

But these men in KAKI wouldn't hear me, they rather relished dishing out bullets as though it were some giveaway package from Santa Clause.

And lo, in split of seconds, I was there on the ground too! Now, not as a living, but as a dead!

I watched as blood gushed profusely out of my tender head.

Though I am dead, I am proud that I was part of a fight. A fight to eradicate the physical & mental slavery; oppression, extortion & corruption.

To re-write narrative & build a society bereft of coercion, a society where we can demand our right without the fear of crucifixion!

Though for few days, I lent my voice! I spoke fearlessly! I aired my plight!

For those few days I shone on my nation some rays of hope, hope of a future void of strife.

Oh...those few days were the best of my pitiable life

Here me, you living!

As I embark on this voyage of no return let my name be graven on the tablet of hearts.

So that when a new Nigeria emerges you may tell the posterity that in the struggle, I was part.

Though, I am dead!

Jubril Olalekan