LET'S TALKAn Article about Men & Women
"We carry the message in many small, subtle, but powerful ways. We do our own recovery work and become a living demonstration of hope, self-love, comfort, and heath. These quiet behaviors can be a powerful message"[1] What a fool I was to take you, Pretty Love, into my household, Shape my days and nights to charm you, Center all my hopes about you, Knowing well I must outlive you, If no trap or shotgun gets me. [2] Most days, women feel like a density cloud away from man, and there is no recycle to fill it with cute words or a 1-800-Flower buds to get it even. How did happen to the pretty details between woman and man? Unlike Machismo [3], which did not seem to know what was the problem or what was the reason we the man and we the woman little by little have begun to split each other. For the last five years, I found this split weird. It took me a week and three days to see that in the clubs, in the gyms, in the theaters, in the streets, in the freeways, as if the women were moving away from men's shadows, and nowhere did I find a drawn as curious as compelling with the couples, but I find women more attached to their girlfriends than men. It did not take me a minute to find out some reason why women have begun to be a solo minder in their daily routine. As a former student of California State University and a junkie-mushier in Hollywood and Santa Monica nightclubs I have known many women. And there I found this Costa Mesa resident worker and student, an aspirant soap opera, told me thing that pushed me back to the classics. Frustrated and humiliated, Beatriz Tocqueville retreated momentary from her own right. "Are men in general beasts?" she asked herself. "Yes, they are. It has not used to be when they're more sensitive and where the physical aspects never have been a problem. Now they seem too cute and too self-image." On that first moment in May as a curious bastard I was, I went to my way to get more about Woman's talk. Without leaving from 24 Fitness Foothill Ram I took more than 100 answers for this simply question: What happen between Woman & Man? A 25-year-old Californian girl Patricia H. Lewis felt that split is part of 'social tension' among man and woman competition in front of sexual independence, but the typical it is too much that the proclamation of survival where weakened mind have made it so complicate. It created, she added, an explicit adjustment in both sexes. This is obvious enough in the argumentation of Lewis, according to her it is not there anymore. "It's nothing personal really," she said with a mysterious smile across her sweating face as she was kicking the pedal of the 'climber' bicycle in front of me. "I've nothing what I have dream that I can get it. Have you read a book called, 'Polite Lie'? [4]'"No, I did not, I replied. She looked at me and shook her head. "That is the paradox about men!" It was nevertheless the risk of alienation that could incorporate in this new approach that Akira Longbirg did not want to take. A Project Specialist in a Research Firm in downtown, Los Angeles, she believed it has to do more about the choice of acting in some manner that is an indirect conflict with the personality of men and women’s discovery that could be said is the possibility that man has begun to act more selfish and he has withdrawn himself altogether from the classical relationship [5]. "Man thinks that we are a sex machine," Akira said. Her head high as she hurled with defiant look toward me sitting in a Melrose leveled-street sidewalk café, Los Angeles, California, after I took my liberty to sit at her table as I began to ask her some questions: What happen between woman & Man? "They've us as an open-legged animal for that purpose." "I am not a 'sex-seeker'[6], but the woman who isn't breeding ground because of man and man has become an “asshole”. I am a freer woman. And you must believe it I can do whatever I please." By the similar impact of the relationship, she was unable to define her points of view as a challenger toward the distance between men and women. "Don't take me wrong, George," a 31-year-old Margarita López from North Hollywood said as she begged me not to print her full name; but in the last minutes, she changed her mind. "I love men. Rather than allow them to pull me into an underground or in a full release of passion, I always let him know what the options are. With no desire to give it back, I often inhibit it as a vulnerable bird. They do not deserve us to be dynamic as before, and that is 1960 storm. There are the beginning steps to eliminating any confusion. The reason is that men have changed a bit. They have become cocky, internet seekers." What is the reason of such changing? Could be an interpretation that opposes his existence but in recognition of woman’s new role and certainly that women have for the past fifteen years broken that invisible chain that attached to them as a false commitment by men. "I don't know what it is," Nicole P. Lingerie of South Gate with such experience of twenty-tree boyfriends and an-almost proposal marriage, said with such calm. "I've tried to find a modern love of what Ma and Pa felt from the first time when they met back in 1936. But I failed, and the chief of this is that man is filled with pig's waste!" Could be then a competing plot-plus confrontation in which there was a manipulated challenge in the rearing make-up women today. In full force, Noemi Maggar, who was proud to say she had a man with whom she loved and she had planned to marry him, she recognized often that harness. "Luckily for them!" she exclaimed as she was sitting around a table at Beverly Hills Mall, waiting for one of her girlfriends to arrive. "It will be nice to have two minds. It is because man’s minds create a powerful correction to any further mistakes. Equally, I accept, however, that man cannot handle it as before and we are losing patience in front of them. They are afraid in front of us who become stronger and smarter." However, Mary Knowless, Social Workers in the City of El Segundo, disagreed. "I haven’t tasted a man for five years now. I'm become aware of man's image problem. Maybe it was back to 1950s when men started calling us 'sweetheart', dearie', and so on, and it was reference to the truly attitude what they felt. In the 1970s, everything had a drastic fall. From now on it is a track when I cannot see anyone with a good feeling what it must be. Better is to do it or not do it at all. Either way I am not into do it. Except for occasional TV Date Dying filled with foolishness. Believe me, I love cock, so what is the point?" That self-disclosure, that was how and to whom one lets himself or herself to have sex wishes, Kimberly Gayden did not see it as a sexual relationship or the real goal to let a man to take her to the bed and had sex with her. She either disagreed about Date Show. "I am a woman if I say otherwise," she said. "Not precisely the point to be dated and have a personal orgasm instead of submit myself into that thing", she said with a self-control mischief, sitting in Cal State University Library. "Well, it is. The way men have begun to behave toward us is awful. There is no escape. This play-fouled thinker believed he is a believer. However, I think he is just a dig-headed soulless, and they manage themselves under that pressure the so-called 'man' before us. Nevertheless, women are a creature of union now. Since the history has begun to call history and women, I can tell you woman has begun to see herself more that a woman than a toy, thank a lot for the women's movement and the transformation of ourselves. The sensibility, this classical alternative happens where the self-worth of being what we are, they recognize now, I hope, not all is playing by the foolish being a man." What about respect? Who would make more roles among them? That is more freedom from the traditional supermodel that the man has created. Having gained the initiative, Carolyn Artuyunyan and Antoinette Melvin-Encino looked at me with uneasy gestures. "Wait-a-minute! We got all that and more," Carolyn said finally, sitting comfortably on a chair in Venice Beach front ashore. "We got that, sugar. I got a job and I got my own place and I got my own car and I can be a self-stimulation bitch (explicit) so do not pitch me, sugar pie. They are scared to us and we do not want to mess it with that big ego. The tell-it-like-it-or-not is man generation has gone. The transformation or the guilt is a reflection that men kept with themselves." "There is not going-on fire," Antoinette said. "Even though I do not sense myself as a romantic person, and this does not mean I am feeling so faithful supporting to have a man to bring this radiated past into my soul! The value is there, but men are loaded with bird’s seed and they are beginning to lose grounds." All attention went to Akiko Kuratoma. "Man is missing the point and I must say, for the first time from those past troubles to the present era of social media." There was more, and Jean R. Guon was hoping that discord of jealousy was just a detached point of view. "There are too many books of superhero," she said as she looked at me very seriously in the level-street coffee shop in Santa Monica City across Ocean Avenue. "However, there is none about female heroine who man has required to be called unique. Only men, and those who are mourning them, they still believe the happiness will not come with physical contact but with wordiness and incomprehension." To settle the matter and to find the reason for this statement, I went myself to Santa Barbara when my last teacher of Psychology lived. I spoke with Lorraine Peoples-Miller. The 79-year-old woman, who for the safety and prosperity had received me with a smile, "It has been a long time," she said as I crossed the narrow hall and sat around at a table where she had already some Kroger crackers and milk. After an hour, the question surprised her again. "You've never given it up, haven't you, huh, George?" "No, Mrs. Peoples-Miller," I said. "And?" "Very well," she said after a long silence. "I don't have the answer as you should know... in my mind that's for the better. Yet women certainly have now a wide enough range of alternative roles to select from. No matter whether it can be accordingly or not, but she can demand for herself a 'cultured' amount freedom of mutual force." After a five-hour talking I was still not satisfied; but it was time to say goodbye. That is when I stood up, kissed her at both cheeks as I dared to take a last shot: "Who will be the winner in this battle?" "Us!" she said quickly, and smiling she added, "Whether that's the way I feel or not, you'll change or you will lose yourself under us!" Author's note The individuals who have appeared in this article are real people. Once again it is time to say how can I thank you all of you and be grateful and unique whatever you do. Blessing to my lovely Canadian French girl Abrielle, who always has encouraged me to write this with open heart, and here is what I came with. My sisters Isabel, Thaili, and my friends Frank, Carlos, Walter, etc. I am forever grateful to Scarlet Leaf Publication, the Internet magazine its staffs to have their time and their patience to read this and to publish this one and give me once again a piece of heaven for a near future. Thank you all of you! Thanks to my writer friends Gil, Hermann, Hana, Katherine Roteriosare, John Smittson, who argued with me that with the best questions I should be asking. Throwers politicized minds, indeed! Many thanks to my teachers Dr. Robert Haban and his wife Nancy during those wonderful moments of bla! Bla! bla! Many thanks to my professor Lorraine Peoples-Miller using always expression like "free man, free woman” that made me to do it right. Once again, I joyfully quote them and if there are some mistakes in their conversation, I will take all the responsibility as a bad listener as that damned recorder was always broken at right moment when I tried to copy from her. Well, let just say it is my fault. References Notes & Books [1]Friedan, Betty, The Feminine Mystique, W.W. Norton & Company, New York/London, 1997, pp. 258-281; p338-378. [2]Millay, Edna St. Vincent, Collected Poems, edited by Norma Millay, Harper & Row, Publishers, New York, 1949. [3]This term is most suitable to Latino men rather than American males. The archetypal of super-hombre Latino; it is the traditional Hispanic male image. The notion could be sexuality in this rush society and also this is the notion that man is unable to be emotional expressive or involve in conation of weakness [4]Mori, Kyoko, Polite Lies: On Being A Woman Caught Between Cultures, Henry Holt and Company, New York, 1997. The Greatest is Love, Published by The World Home Bible League, 1967. Borysenko, Joan, A Woman's Book of Life: The Biology, Psychology, and Spirituality of the Feminine Life Cycle, Riverhead Books. New York, 1996. Beattie, Melody, The Language of Letting Go: Daily Meditations for Codependents, A Hazelden Book, HarperCollinsPublishers, 1990, p.343 [5] In our interview, she told me that she believed in Betty Friedan, the American writer who wrote the book named Feminine Mystique. Also she stated from a book called "The Greatest is Love" published by The World Home Bible League, the followed lines, Act 15:24 p188: 'We understand that some believers from here have upset you and questioned your salvation, but they had no such instruction from us.' In the way she said it I recognized she was upset against men in general. However, I have never a woman with such control and power in her voice that I did not notice it. [6] This is term that Betty Friedan (1997) uses in her book, "The Feminine Mystique" that Akira has repeated it throughout our interview with a different meaning. "I did not do a Kinsey study," Friedan starts in Chapter 11 (The Sex-Seekers). But when I was on the trail of the problem that has no name, the suburban housewives I interviewed would often give me an explicitly sexual answer to a question that was not sexual at all." Friedan, Betty, "The Feminine Mystique", W.W.Norton & Company, Mew York/London, 1997, p258.
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Moritz Thomsen: His Letters and His Legacy |
John Chizoba Vincent is a poet, Author, Cinematographer and filmmaker. He was born and brought up in Aba and later moved to Lagos where he had his tertiary education . His works have appeared on allpoetry, Voicesnet, Poetrysoup Poemhunter, Africanwriter, TuckMagazine, Gaze,naijastories, Praxismagazine, Nairaland, black boy reviews and forthcoming in BrittlePapers. His writings have featured in many anthologies both home and abroad. He has five books published to his credit which includes Good Mama, Hard times, Letter From Home, For Boys Of Tomorrow. He lives in Lagos where he writes. |
BURYING THE DEAD IS MORE EXPENSIVE THAN CARING FOR THE LIVING IN SOME PARTS OF NIGERIA
"The man that buried his father with cow
and the man that buried his father with hen,
each did according to their ability". Igbo Proverb.
The chaos and havoc experienced in some families when sharing what a dead man left behind is very alarming and disturbing especially if the dead man was wealthy or an influential person in the country or when he die leaving no will to the children. Even if he has wills, the uncles, Aunties, mothers, kindred, village clans and many other relatives won't allow those whom the properties are willed to to have peace of mind until there is chaos in the family concerning the sharing of these properties.
Even if your father have nothing, his clothes sometimes cause trouble among his children and some of his relatives especially in a polygamous family. I'm a witness of this. I have seen a brother killed his brother because of his late father's property. I have witnessed where a sister made her own brother mad because of their late father's properties. The list goes on and on and on. My mother always told us that there is no gain fighting over the properties of a dead man.
During the sharing of these properties, you come to realise that that your uncle that has one leg can actually fight better than those that have two legs.You will see that that your blind auntie can see better than those that have eyes. You come to realise that salivating on someone's face is normal and the custom and tradition of your village accept that.
when someone dies, the family gathers to plan for the burial, that is when they will know that the licking roof needs to be replaced, the cracked walls need to be fixed, the floor needs to be tilled, the curtains needs to be replaced then finally the walls need to be painted.
It's during burial that your family worth are measured by outsiders, if they perceived your family to be rich they want to see a colourful and expensive ceremony on that day but if the funeral wasn't that big enough to their taste, it shows that your family isn't rich or among the well-To- Do in the society. If your family is poor, they already knew that they would be the one to contribute for the coffin and drinks, food and palm wines, but bear it in mind for that single help from the kins men from your clan, you must not talk any how to your fellows either in the village or outside the village because if you misbehave or talk to anyone of those who helped to finance your father's burial any how, they will remind you how they contributed to bury your father and how you could not bury your father and this, would definitely be a shame on your own side. And this kind of statement can make the man in you to fold into scramble of papers. Some people know what I'm saying.
"When my father died on the 30th of October 1998, being the first son I summoned a meeting with the elders of my place; after a very long meeting, the expenses for the funeral was above 1 million naira" said one of my neighbours to me when we were discussing about this issue. I'm a listener and most of the things I write about are from those things I listened and observed from people.
" Why should it cost so much for funeral in Nigeria? More advanced countries don't spend one tenth of what we spend here." He continued.
It is very important to throw an expensive funeral to pay the last respect to our loved ones but it should not be done while the living are hungry and miserably tattered and confused. Let the dead be honoured but not to the detriment of the living, to the detriment of those living; who still have a future to go for. Not to the detriment of those who still live on the surface of the earth.
It is not only the money that you are being charged by the kindred that matters but also some other expenses that will arise during this funeral. It is another way of making money in many part of Nigeria especially in the Eastern part of Nigeria. It is another means of fighting and arguing over who takes this or that from the man's belongings after the burial. It is another mean to kill one another because of another man's sweat.
Some people get killed during this time and some are injured by others. I could remember when one of my In-laws died, his people came to his house and packed all his belongs not excluding common pin. They didn't leave anything for the woman to take care of the four children the man left behind. It is very disheartening when you see a situation like this. Is sharing a dead man's property better than taking care of his children?
For example, When you see a core igbo man buried outside his village, then there are issues to be settled within the families in the village because the money the elders or his clan could have collected from his children or relations, they didn't collect it. It is very obvious, and this, we need to stop. Those elders should not be demanding much before a person would be buried in his home town.
Perhaps all these burial expenses come up because many of these people have been to their friends' family and see how burial celebration are done and inviting them to their own family means putting all those things in place if not those coming for the burial will go home with shame considering the kind of expensive life they are living in the city. Sometimes, I don't see it working that way. Once someone is dead, I think the rightful thing to do is to commit him or her to mother earth than making unnecessary expenses which leaves people in debt after everything.
However, in igbo culture or tradition, if you don't bury your late father at home, your mates will one day laugh at you that your kins men can't locate where your father was buried and that alone will definitely make you a lesser man or makes you feel like an outcaste among your people. And in some part of Igbo society, they are some titles that you can not be given as a successful man later in the future when your father is not buried in his home town or buried properly.
The culture of excessive spending during burial is a cause for worry in our society, especially at financial time like we are in. People should consider the living, those that need the money more are those people that are alive not those dead. Nawaoh days, it is a time to know which family is really rich and those that are poor and oppressed. You have to spend and get your lips and pocket ripped off just to satisfy the curioty of many especially the kindred.
One of my neigbours once told me that he lost two mothers at the same month -his mother and paternal grand mother - 2016 and for reasons bothering on fulfilling customs, traditions and meeting the conditions spelt by their families, he had to bury them 2018. He had to borrow! He had to borrow money to meet up the standard of funeral in his village. Those elders don't even care if you recover the money or not but the truth of the matter is that you have to settle many things so that the funeral can hold in the village. Frankly, when I think of burials, I envy the Muslims with their culture of burial. They are great with that. They are absolutely sensible in that department.
It is no longer a hidden fact that some Igbos particularly those from Anambra and some people from Abia do not conduct funerals to make loss anymore, yes, they do not. Some strategies and methods are always in place on how to cover expenses. The ceremonies are conducted in such a way that a painful or funeral profit is made from invited guest from families, relatives, brothers and sisters and other far distant friends of the children. The worst expectation is a breakeven because of the amount of money spent in the funeral.
Just know that in many cases, loans are taken with lands pledged as collateral and most often, properties are sold to fund a funeral in some part of Nigeria. And after the burial, the children start paying for those debt they incurred. Wouldn’t it be stupid for one to make a loss or lose the collateral by making a loss in the funeral? So these days, going to some funerals, your pocket must be filled with money else, you would be seen as someone else.
You now understand why no sympathizer is entertained in some funerals until he or she presents the monetary or Gifts equivalent to his/her sympathy to the bereaved family. Yes, it is specially strategied and principled to that so that you don't just come and eat rice and stew and chicken without leaving something tangible behind. No one would drop nothing and expects to be given food or beer and gifts worth more than others who have given in a funeral ceremony.
Burying a dead man is more expensive than caring for the living in my country home!
and the man that buried his father with hen,
each did according to their ability". Igbo Proverb.
The chaos and havoc experienced in some families when sharing what a dead man left behind is very alarming and disturbing especially if the dead man was wealthy or an influential person in the country or when he die leaving no will to the children. Even if he has wills, the uncles, Aunties, mothers, kindred, village clans and many other relatives won't allow those whom the properties are willed to to have peace of mind until there is chaos in the family concerning the sharing of these properties.
Even if your father have nothing, his clothes sometimes cause trouble among his children and some of his relatives especially in a polygamous family. I'm a witness of this. I have seen a brother killed his brother because of his late father's property. I have witnessed where a sister made her own brother mad because of their late father's properties. The list goes on and on and on. My mother always told us that there is no gain fighting over the properties of a dead man.
During the sharing of these properties, you come to realise that that your uncle that has one leg can actually fight better than those that have two legs.You will see that that your blind auntie can see better than those that have eyes. You come to realise that salivating on someone's face is normal and the custom and tradition of your village accept that.
when someone dies, the family gathers to plan for the burial, that is when they will know that the licking roof needs to be replaced, the cracked walls need to be fixed, the floor needs to be tilled, the curtains needs to be replaced then finally the walls need to be painted.
It's during burial that your family worth are measured by outsiders, if they perceived your family to be rich they want to see a colourful and expensive ceremony on that day but if the funeral wasn't that big enough to their taste, it shows that your family isn't rich or among the well-To- Do in the society. If your family is poor, they already knew that they would be the one to contribute for the coffin and drinks, food and palm wines, but bear it in mind for that single help from the kins men from your clan, you must not talk any how to your fellows either in the village or outside the village because if you misbehave or talk to anyone of those who helped to finance your father's burial any how, they will remind you how they contributed to bury your father and how you could not bury your father and this, would definitely be a shame on your own side. And this kind of statement can make the man in you to fold into scramble of papers. Some people know what I'm saying.
"When my father died on the 30th of October 1998, being the first son I summoned a meeting with the elders of my place; after a very long meeting, the expenses for the funeral was above 1 million naira" said one of my neighbours to me when we were discussing about this issue. I'm a listener and most of the things I write about are from those things I listened and observed from people.
" Why should it cost so much for funeral in Nigeria? More advanced countries don't spend one tenth of what we spend here." He continued.
It is very important to throw an expensive funeral to pay the last respect to our loved ones but it should not be done while the living are hungry and miserably tattered and confused. Let the dead be honoured but not to the detriment of the living, to the detriment of those living; who still have a future to go for. Not to the detriment of those who still live on the surface of the earth.
It is not only the money that you are being charged by the kindred that matters but also some other expenses that will arise during this funeral. It is another way of making money in many part of Nigeria especially in the Eastern part of Nigeria. It is another means of fighting and arguing over who takes this or that from the man's belongings after the burial. It is another mean to kill one another because of another man's sweat.
Some people get killed during this time and some are injured by others. I could remember when one of my In-laws died, his people came to his house and packed all his belongs not excluding common pin. They didn't leave anything for the woman to take care of the four children the man left behind. It is very disheartening when you see a situation like this. Is sharing a dead man's property better than taking care of his children?
For example, When you see a core igbo man buried outside his village, then there are issues to be settled within the families in the village because the money the elders or his clan could have collected from his children or relations, they didn't collect it. It is very obvious, and this, we need to stop. Those elders should not be demanding much before a person would be buried in his home town.
Perhaps all these burial expenses come up because many of these people have been to their friends' family and see how burial celebration are done and inviting them to their own family means putting all those things in place if not those coming for the burial will go home with shame considering the kind of expensive life they are living in the city. Sometimes, I don't see it working that way. Once someone is dead, I think the rightful thing to do is to commit him or her to mother earth than making unnecessary expenses which leaves people in debt after everything.
However, in igbo culture or tradition, if you don't bury your late father at home, your mates will one day laugh at you that your kins men can't locate where your father was buried and that alone will definitely make you a lesser man or makes you feel like an outcaste among your people. And in some part of Igbo society, they are some titles that you can not be given as a successful man later in the future when your father is not buried in his home town or buried properly.
The culture of excessive spending during burial is a cause for worry in our society, especially at financial time like we are in. People should consider the living, those that need the money more are those people that are alive not those dead. Nawaoh days, it is a time to know which family is really rich and those that are poor and oppressed. You have to spend and get your lips and pocket ripped off just to satisfy the curioty of many especially the kindred.
One of my neigbours once told me that he lost two mothers at the same month -his mother and paternal grand mother - 2016 and for reasons bothering on fulfilling customs, traditions and meeting the conditions spelt by their families, he had to bury them 2018. He had to borrow! He had to borrow money to meet up the standard of funeral in his village. Those elders don't even care if you recover the money or not but the truth of the matter is that you have to settle many things so that the funeral can hold in the village. Frankly, when I think of burials, I envy the Muslims with their culture of burial. They are great with that. They are absolutely sensible in that department.
It is no longer a hidden fact that some Igbos particularly those from Anambra and some people from Abia do not conduct funerals to make loss anymore, yes, they do not. Some strategies and methods are always in place on how to cover expenses. The ceremonies are conducted in such a way that a painful or funeral profit is made from invited guest from families, relatives, brothers and sisters and other far distant friends of the children. The worst expectation is a breakeven because of the amount of money spent in the funeral.
Just know that in many cases, loans are taken with lands pledged as collateral and most often, properties are sold to fund a funeral in some part of Nigeria. And after the burial, the children start paying for those debt they incurred. Wouldn’t it be stupid for one to make a loss or lose the collateral by making a loss in the funeral? So these days, going to some funerals, your pocket must be filled with money else, you would be seen as someone else.
You now understand why no sympathizer is entertained in some funerals until he or she presents the monetary or Gifts equivalent to his/her sympathy to the bereaved family. Yes, it is specially strategied and principled to that so that you don't just come and eat rice and stew and chicken without leaving something tangible behind. No one would drop nothing and expects to be given food or beer and gifts worth more than others who have given in a funeral ceremony.
Burying a dead man is more expensive than caring for the living in my country home!
JOHN CHIZOBA VINCENT - QUESTIONING THE ILLUSION OF SOME MADE-IN-HEAVEN-WEDDINGS IN NIGERIA
10/8/2019
John Chizoba Vincent is a poet, Author, Cinematographer and filmmaker. He was born and brought up in Aba and later moved to Lagos where he had his tertiary education . His works have appeared on allpoetry, Voicesnet, Poetrysoup Poemhunter, Africanwriter, TuckMagazine, Gaze,naijastories, Praxismagazine, Nairaland, black boy reviews and forthcoming in BrittlePapers. His writings have featured in many anthologies both home and abroad. He has five books published to his credit which includes Good Mama, Hard times, Letter From Home, For Boys Of Tomorrow. He lives in Lagos where he writes. |
QUESTIONING THE ILLUSION OF SOME MADE-IN-HEAVEN-WEDDINGS IN NIGERIA
Ladies, it is good to have a made-in-heaven-wedding, it is good to have that talk-of-the-town-wedding; the wedding that the story and its pictures appear on newspapers, magazines and gets everyone in town talking about it after that day. It is very wonderful for you to have those extraordinary wedding pictures by that super photographer, to appear on the national dailies, and you have them on the cover page of many magazines. Wouldn’t it be a great and mouth watery experience? Yes, it is great to have everybody talking about how extravagant your wedding was and how they were able to feel great and exceptional in your wedding but, why would you want to push your man into debt? You know in your heart of heart that he is not Dangote’s son and you are not Adeleke’s Daughter and he is not capable to handle what you dream of. Why would you want to push him into trouble? Would you want your husband to become poor after the wedding? You know he is not Adenuga and you are not Bill Gate’s Daughter! How would you feel after your wedding and your husband begins to run here and there to borrow money to pay back his debt or to borrow money so that you two can eat? Would you be happy to see him run from pillar to post because of the debt he incurred during your wedding? Yes, people will come, talk about the wedding, the grooving, enjoyment and all that but what matters is life after the wedding.
Your honeymoon may last for some weeks or some months in America, Dubai, and Paris or in Canada but after that, what next? What would you do when there is no food at home to eat? What would you do when people that your husband borrowed money from to make the wedding outstanding starts coming to disturb your peace? Moreover, it is not compulsory that people must talk about your wedding. Just have it in mind, whether you spent two billion naira in your wedding or you spend a hundred thousand in your wedding people must see one bad aspect of it.
Remember, wedding is just for a day and marriage is for a life time when everybody who came to your wedding is no more and you are left with your wife to cater for her then you may understand the whole scenarios. Your father and your mother will always come once or twice in a month or sometimes they don’t come at all, you have started building your own family and nobody cares what you make of it. Money won’t come rushing to you after the said wedding and you must work harder to provide and to feed your newly wedded wife and same people will be expecting to visit back after nine months for another celebration. What will your life and that of your new wife be after these nine months?
This Made-in-heaven wedding always gets the newly wedded couple into trouble and debt. It is always good to avoid it. It is always advisable to avoid unnecessary expenses during your wedding planning. It is better to work and plan with the budget at hand than to borrow money and end up running here and there trying to see how you could pay the money back. No woman should be in a position to force her man to do a wedding beyond his budget, you shouldn’t force him to organize what he may end up regretting or the both of you will end up regretting as husband and wife. And men, don’t listen to that woman that wants you to go above your budget or above what the two of you have budgeted for your wedding. If she thinks you are not up to her standard, perhaps she should check the next man next door. Marriage is not by force and expensive wedding should not be a tool to qualify how a man will take care of his wife.
Sometimes ago, a man in my compound wanted to get married. He wasn’t that rich a man; in fact, he owed the landlord for two years. For complete two years he was not able to pay his house rent, everybody in the compound knew that he was going through tough and hard times. Each time the landlord came around for his money, he would either give him one excuse or the other. Sometimes, he would run away from the house to avoid the landlord’s troubles. The landlord got tired of him. He could not come any more because of him. He had served him quit notice on several occasions and this man refused to pay him or pack away. He had threatened to pack all his properties outside to no avail. The day of his wedding, the hall was filled with people. It was a made-in-heaven-wedding, every one of us were surprised that he could spend such amount of money in a wedding when he still owes the landlord for two years.
Many dignitaries came around. Assorted food were available, serve yourself; eat whatsoever you want. The landlord was invited for the reception and we saw how surprised he was sitting down among us. After the wedding, the said man travelled to Dubai for his Honeymoon. When he came back from his honeymoon, it was the same compound he came back to. It doesn’t take time for the landlord to send for him. He was served quit notice which we later learnt that he came pleading with the landlord to give him more time to pay his bills but we all knew he was broke and he can’t pay the money. Some months later, he was dragged out of the compound after many court cases.
There is nothing wrong planning a made-in-heaven-wedding when the money is there but it becomes so wrong when after the wedding, you end up having nothing left for you and your husband to live on. You become broke and poorer. The gift collected might not be measured to the money spent. There is nothing wrong with making your bride feel like a queen on her special day but don’t do it if you don’t have the budget at hand. Don’t please anybody to displease yourself. Even those friends whom you wanted to show off to won’t be there when the fight will break out in the house. Handle things cleverly and manly.
The aftermath of things is what actually matters not what is in before us.
People are watching and the same people that advised you when you were planning the wedding to do it in a special way will still be the same people that will abuse you when after the wedding and you don’t have anything to take care of your wife; they would still be the same people that will make mockery of you on how tattered your wife is and how you were not taking care of her like a wife. The problem remains that you can’t please everyone, whether you wed your wife in a kiosk, people will talk about it; whether you wed her in a world class hotel or hall; people will still talk about it, even if it happens to be in an Airplane or in an aisle of gold and silver, people would see one good or bad thing to talk about. And no matter how you plan your wedding, on that day, people will still complain of not eating your wedding Rice and Chicken while others would eat to their satisfaction. The point here is that don’t engage yourself in an unnecessary expenses that would render you koboless after your wedding ceremony.
Furthermore, this issue of ladies convincing a man to do it this way or that way going against his will or plan is wrong. You have to know your man’s opinions on some certain things especially finances. Those things he may think is not necessary, try to listen to him. Don’t mount pressure on him to do it because Amaka did it in her wedding day. Even if you have the money to do it, I think you should reserve the money for other issues that might arise after the wedding. There are many issues that will arise after the wedding and you can’t escape it. I could remember one of my uncles borrowed a huge amount of money to do his wedding about five years ago. He wanted to make it ‘special’, a world class wedding and traditional marriage. He bought three hefty cows, bought unnecessary things that were not in the list that his in-laws gave to him. My mother cautioned him, people cautioned him but the man who is in love to please people, you cannot hold him back from what he has in mind to do. The wedding came and gone, those people he borrowed money from began to come one after the other. His businesses were not moving as he wanted. Hunger came and heavy rain began to fall in his house. There wasn’t a day that one man won’t come to make noise in our compound. At the end of the day, the so called wife left him when she realized that it was all pretense; the man she thought that had money was just a shadow of himself.
On a lighter note, why spend your life savings in the name of wedding that will last just for a day? Why put your life in jeopardy? Why create a false identity? There is no problem if the money is there to be spent; there is no problem if there are enough people to sponsor this mega Made-In-heaven-wedding. There is no problem if there’s money and enough supporters out there. There is no reason for love! You can’t show her how much you love her by lavishing cash on your wedding day; what if the money wasn’t there? Would she still love you? What if this money wasn’t there and you are wedding her in local church or hall; would she still be there? Remember those people that came for your wedding ceremony won’t be there in your marriage, spend less and plan for your union. The youths should be careful of this, don’t live above your income, and learn from other people’s mistakes even from your father’s experiences.
Question many things; question how it happened and why it happened. Planning a wedding is not a day thing but no matter what, don’t plan above your budget and don’t let any lady to convince you to do so just to show how much you love her. What is ahead is greater than what we see now. What matters is what you do after your wedding, after that proclamation in the church; after that vote of thanks when everyone else is leaving the wedding hall and your wife is either sitting or standing behind you, hugging excitedly those that came to celebrate with her.
Your honeymoon may last for some weeks or some months in America, Dubai, and Paris or in Canada but after that, what next? What would you do when there is no food at home to eat? What would you do when people that your husband borrowed money from to make the wedding outstanding starts coming to disturb your peace? Moreover, it is not compulsory that people must talk about your wedding. Just have it in mind, whether you spent two billion naira in your wedding or you spend a hundred thousand in your wedding people must see one bad aspect of it.
Remember, wedding is just for a day and marriage is for a life time when everybody who came to your wedding is no more and you are left with your wife to cater for her then you may understand the whole scenarios. Your father and your mother will always come once or twice in a month or sometimes they don’t come at all, you have started building your own family and nobody cares what you make of it. Money won’t come rushing to you after the said wedding and you must work harder to provide and to feed your newly wedded wife and same people will be expecting to visit back after nine months for another celebration. What will your life and that of your new wife be after these nine months?
This Made-in-heaven wedding always gets the newly wedded couple into trouble and debt. It is always good to avoid it. It is always advisable to avoid unnecessary expenses during your wedding planning. It is better to work and plan with the budget at hand than to borrow money and end up running here and there trying to see how you could pay the money back. No woman should be in a position to force her man to do a wedding beyond his budget, you shouldn’t force him to organize what he may end up regretting or the both of you will end up regretting as husband and wife. And men, don’t listen to that woman that wants you to go above your budget or above what the two of you have budgeted for your wedding. If she thinks you are not up to her standard, perhaps she should check the next man next door. Marriage is not by force and expensive wedding should not be a tool to qualify how a man will take care of his wife.
Sometimes ago, a man in my compound wanted to get married. He wasn’t that rich a man; in fact, he owed the landlord for two years. For complete two years he was not able to pay his house rent, everybody in the compound knew that he was going through tough and hard times. Each time the landlord came around for his money, he would either give him one excuse or the other. Sometimes, he would run away from the house to avoid the landlord’s troubles. The landlord got tired of him. He could not come any more because of him. He had served him quit notice on several occasions and this man refused to pay him or pack away. He had threatened to pack all his properties outside to no avail. The day of his wedding, the hall was filled with people. It was a made-in-heaven-wedding, every one of us were surprised that he could spend such amount of money in a wedding when he still owes the landlord for two years.
Many dignitaries came around. Assorted food were available, serve yourself; eat whatsoever you want. The landlord was invited for the reception and we saw how surprised he was sitting down among us. After the wedding, the said man travelled to Dubai for his Honeymoon. When he came back from his honeymoon, it was the same compound he came back to. It doesn’t take time for the landlord to send for him. He was served quit notice which we later learnt that he came pleading with the landlord to give him more time to pay his bills but we all knew he was broke and he can’t pay the money. Some months later, he was dragged out of the compound after many court cases.
There is nothing wrong planning a made-in-heaven-wedding when the money is there but it becomes so wrong when after the wedding, you end up having nothing left for you and your husband to live on. You become broke and poorer. The gift collected might not be measured to the money spent. There is nothing wrong with making your bride feel like a queen on her special day but don’t do it if you don’t have the budget at hand. Don’t please anybody to displease yourself. Even those friends whom you wanted to show off to won’t be there when the fight will break out in the house. Handle things cleverly and manly.
The aftermath of things is what actually matters not what is in before us.
People are watching and the same people that advised you when you were planning the wedding to do it in a special way will still be the same people that will abuse you when after the wedding and you don’t have anything to take care of your wife; they would still be the same people that will make mockery of you on how tattered your wife is and how you were not taking care of her like a wife. The problem remains that you can’t please everyone, whether you wed your wife in a kiosk, people will talk about it; whether you wed her in a world class hotel or hall; people will still talk about it, even if it happens to be in an Airplane or in an aisle of gold and silver, people would see one good or bad thing to talk about. And no matter how you plan your wedding, on that day, people will still complain of not eating your wedding Rice and Chicken while others would eat to their satisfaction. The point here is that don’t engage yourself in an unnecessary expenses that would render you koboless after your wedding ceremony.
Furthermore, this issue of ladies convincing a man to do it this way or that way going against his will or plan is wrong. You have to know your man’s opinions on some certain things especially finances. Those things he may think is not necessary, try to listen to him. Don’t mount pressure on him to do it because Amaka did it in her wedding day. Even if you have the money to do it, I think you should reserve the money for other issues that might arise after the wedding. There are many issues that will arise after the wedding and you can’t escape it. I could remember one of my uncles borrowed a huge amount of money to do his wedding about five years ago. He wanted to make it ‘special’, a world class wedding and traditional marriage. He bought three hefty cows, bought unnecessary things that were not in the list that his in-laws gave to him. My mother cautioned him, people cautioned him but the man who is in love to please people, you cannot hold him back from what he has in mind to do. The wedding came and gone, those people he borrowed money from began to come one after the other. His businesses were not moving as he wanted. Hunger came and heavy rain began to fall in his house. There wasn’t a day that one man won’t come to make noise in our compound. At the end of the day, the so called wife left him when she realized that it was all pretense; the man she thought that had money was just a shadow of himself.
On a lighter note, why spend your life savings in the name of wedding that will last just for a day? Why put your life in jeopardy? Why create a false identity? There is no problem if the money is there to be spent; there is no problem if there are enough people to sponsor this mega Made-In-heaven-wedding. There is no problem if there’s money and enough supporters out there. There is no reason for love! You can’t show her how much you love her by lavishing cash on your wedding day; what if the money wasn’t there? Would she still love you? What if this money wasn’t there and you are wedding her in local church or hall; would she still be there? Remember those people that came for your wedding ceremony won’t be there in your marriage, spend less and plan for your union. The youths should be careful of this, don’t live above your income, and learn from other people’s mistakes even from your father’s experiences.
Question many things; question how it happened and why it happened. Planning a wedding is not a day thing but no matter what, don’t plan above your budget and don’t let any lady to convince you to do so just to show how much you love her. What is ahead is greater than what we see now. What matters is what you do after your wedding, after that proclamation in the church; after that vote of thanks when everyone else is leaving the wedding hall and your wife is either sitting or standing behind you, hugging excitedly those that came to celebrate with her.
John Chizoba Vincent is a poet, Author, Cinematographer and filmmaker. He was born and brought up in Aba and later moved to Lagos where he had his tertiary education . His works have appeared on allpoetry, Voicesnet, Poetrysoup Poemhunter, Africanwriter, TuckMagazine, Gaze,naijastories, Praxismagazine, Nairaland, black boy reviews and forthcoming in BrittlePapers. His writings have featured in many anthologies both home and abroad. He has five books published to his credit which includes Good Mama, Hard times, Letter From Home, For Boys Of Tomorrow. He lives in Lagos where he writes |
LETTERS: LETTER TO GOD
Dear God,
We’ve been friends even as my mother conceived me. You told her that you love me. You told her that everything that concerns me touches you in the heart. You told her that you knew me even before she conceived me. You said to her: that my expectation shall not be cut off by any man or any woman. You said to her, that you are my pillar and my fortress and my strong tower and nothing is too hard for you to do for me. I know you as you knew me right from the beginning of time immemorial. Then, why has the mountain failed to move? Why is the pillar holding the world shaking? Why is the world basking on my weaknesses? Why has evil triumph over me? Where are you? Where is your will? Why are your ears too far from my words? Why don't you command this sickness out of the way? Why have they tormented us this far like we have no father above? Why free the Devil to use us like he wants? Why? Why? I ran to mother in the deadly hours of the night, I saw her in supplication to no one else but you.
I saw that Chinedu was still sick. I saw tears in the face of Father, father whose mighty hands built the church cathedral. I could remember when he said that you told him to give all his best and he gathered some of his brothers and sisters and sold the whole lands he inherited from his father. He gave the proceeds to the church of God according to the prophecy. He called it a seed, yes, he called it a seed to God and we all believed him because he believed in you. He was mocked by all but he waited. He waited for you to answer him but you were far, far from him. maybe the time has not come, maybe, he might be lucky if he waits a little longer. You were not there to rescue him when sickness came. You were not there to rescue him when he had an accident. You should have averted the accident to somewhere else because he pays his tithe and gives his offering. Father’s favourite line from the holy Book says that:
“…And you will devour the devourer and the cankerworms…”
That was the lines we grew up hearing him quote each time he was counting his tithe and whenever he paid his tithe. You were not there to heal his second daughter Chikamso. She died in pains of Cancer and was buried while you watched from heaven.
Meanwhile, father trusted in you. You said that those that trusted in you will never be put to shame but he did. Look at mother in supplication every now and then. She had made the kitchen her home. The kitchen where the memories of Chikamso started, the kitchen where she first collapsed, the kitchen where Kambili died; the kitchen where her dog was poisoned; the kitchen where she birthed Mary, her memories started right here in the kitchen not in the bedroom but here where seeking for freedom is the deadliest thing that ever happened to mankind. Nothing is worth anything to a dead man, not even his money. It is how boys were raped and we could not see God come to their rescue in the midst of many deadly torments and torture. It is how girls were abused and we could not lay hands on the mercy of God rather his words came before the sun of the day to hurt us fiercely on our craving skins. It is how we were taking into exile and the spirit of God was nowhere to be found. It is how our brothers and sisters were killed on the gory land called Nigeria. We could not find God in their midst yet, we believed that he is ever present to us.
Mother is still in the kitchen, father is still holding on tears just like what the society told him that a man must not cry because he is a man, that a man must not show his weaknesses because he is a man. God, now that Mary is no more here to sing of how great you are, our mouths are ceased of praises. How could you have allowed Mary to leave us here alone? How could you have allowed her to journey alone in the void places holding no one by her side? Who would then sing in this morning devotion? Who would then raise a song of praises to you without holding back his tears? We are all dying, and we must all die if Mary did not return home. Maybe death is the safest place to lay down ourselves till eternity. Her smiling portrait rests on the heart of every one of us, capped with a lonely empty feeling. How could you’ve allowed death to snatch her away from us? How could you have allowed her the freedom to paradise without first consulting her? You further made her pass through pains and sorrow before you took her away. Why?
Now, who will go to church with her Bible to worship you? Who will then clap hands like her in the church if she did not return? Is Cruelty served in your plate? You took her down so bitterly with no complain; agony randomly blue ticked all her texts. She endured the pains and wished for the best but the best never came to her. Even when the world within her was at rest, no favors, and no gains, just a troublesome quest, but wait, why do we run to you after being frightened? Why do we forget you’re the same God that cares nothing about us in this side of the world? Why do we pray if not for it to be answered? The Demons use us here like we were some rolls of paper, like we were a blunt meant to be finished but make sure their feelings were satisfied, they use us like a peddler, only when they need us.
Should I tell papa to go to the altar and take back the money he sowed as a seed for the wellbeing of Mary? Should I tell mother to stop fasting or to go to church and request for her car that she sowed as an offering for Mary’s recovery? Anyways, you are still God with or without those things and us. You are still there as God and no one can question your authority as they rightly said. But, I am bringing this to you that Satan is not at rest and you should not be at rest also. If Mary after all she had done in the house of God could die then life itself is meaningless to every human being. Having this thought all day long makes me think of losing myself to the wind. It makes me want to rest myself in the vacuum of lonely days till the trumpet will sound for Christ to come to our rescue if possible. Tomorrow sounds good and poisonous defining the art through which we were made. Tomorrow is a school of thought with the definition of unknown and you know you made it so. If only we could number our days here on earth; man will be better than he is now. If only tomorrow is known to us, man would learn how to manage himself to the fullest but tomorrow is unknown.
Papa has being on a wheel chair for the past fifteen years. He had an accident doing your work. Sister Amaka has not given birth for the past ten years and she is among the pastors in the church. She counseled a sister who wanted to abort her child yesterday. Later today, she heard that the same sister has ended up aborting the child. I know your time is the best but she is being mocked by people she is better than. They looked straight into her eyes and mock her aggressively. Even those she called sons and daughters in the Lord mock her also. We were told that the devil locked up her womb because she is a Christian. Is that so? Where are you, God?
Brother Ezeugo lost his job last year because he was caught preaching the gospel to one of his coworkers. We all know that these are temptations to show your supremacy over all things but you are still God with or without all these temptations. And now Ogba is suffering of pile…! I know you know about this but, when will all this end? Should we switch places and find peace somewhere else? Should we tell them that you are no longer God? Should we continue to plead that we may be called humans? No!
Yesterday, I was in the church again and the man of God spoke about heaven and hell. He taught us about paradise on earth and an ensnaring hell fire for sinners. He said there is a Hell fire waiting for all sinners, those who disobeyed God. I was surprise hearing this again. I was astonished of how a lovely father would punish his children in the lake of fire because of disobedient. I was wondering why but I could not get an answer to the question. I wonder how you will feel seeing your children that you created burn and scream for help from the fire. Would you just close your eyes and ears for us to burn till eternity or would you quash the fire when you have mercy on us or would you just allow us to perish? If so, why did you create us, for you to burn us like that?
When Mary was alive, she was a chorister. Later, she was ordained as a pastor and she was up and doing. She did all that she could to put smiles on people’s faces. She won many souls to the kingdom and was called mother Theresa of our generation. She built many foundations where the motherless and the orphans could be taken care of but after all, she died as a no body.
She died just like a fowl. She asked that I suck her memories away; she asked that I be her eyes, so i began from the beginning of her making until she gave up the ghost— i touched her like feathers on the wings of a seabird on the day she gave up as a human. She floated and ached in my bones but I asked for peace but it was far away from me. Peace which no one could give but only you. I shivered and woke in her skin, i nibbled into her nipples but all was lifeless to the core. I and her mother and her father moaned looking at her face lying on the bed. Her spirit taught us how to run, to disallow little demons from telling us how her vagina looks like. I think you know all of this. I know you know them all, God. Life has taught us to wear the cloths of our fathers and that of misery — "riches are never available” that was what misery told us. Life said that we should be scarce; we cannot cut our heart for a river flowing with dismissal. Life is a docile, a door less room where everything escape at will. Life is a misery only known to it by itself.
Let’s learn how to plant our lips only on our mouth day and night so that we could suck out mother and her mother’s dirge and her father's mother elegy before the black goats go into the dark night to look for yams to misuse. Let’s turn our hands into a song from which your mouth ache again and again at your inabilities. We are all humans learning to throw ourselves to the world like our kites dangling to wind songs without holding anything as a common desire to hurt others of their misfortunes. In the terrain of blue skies, we will become tired humans learning to empty our wisdoms through the names of the grave but before then, let’s knit to our father's names to look for why our prayers take time to be answered and why we die and where we could find death. How do you think you carve the name of death after you die? On the sand towers? On the bridge of hope or on the bodies of the skies?
God, do you know I gave myself big eyes and big dreams and big faiths and big distance and bigger height just like the Egyptian’s pyramid? Do you know that when time becomes darkness we must beat with torchlight? I may not likely tell you that I am not asking, you know I have being asking and waiting for the answer; no Raven remain in the sky to convey my messages to you, none. I seek the boldness of the wind to take my pleas to you so that life will not make me feel like a fatherless when you are still alive. Just in case I misstep, just in case I no longer dream; just in case I may think of losing it all, just us in separate worlds dancing in the wind.
It is how I and father and mother and the remaining brothers of mine took the stairs in our lives with bowties of everyday barriers because the songs of human are a case in the courtyard of perpetuity. There are stories in the eyes of those boys who went and never came back to this world. There are somehow prices in the eyes of those women and men who are murdered every day in our streets? There are untold tales in the mouths of those our brothers and sisters who were killed by terrorist groups and herdsmen! There are many stories, dear God. Why were they brought to this world in the first place? Why are we here? To drink, produce and die?
Flinging mangoes against the window netting and making the electric wires hit each other and spark bright orange flames, is how men and women are lured into brokenness, because each time day breaks, it reminds men to work harder and toil more than the veins in their bodies because sweating is how a man poses and take pictures to remind himself of how he started. This is how our stories are told anywhere where the world is said to be round and flat. Every day, the human race is scrunched up with the noses at the smell of bloody fresh meat and musty dried fish and their heads are lowered from the bees that buzzed in thick clouds over the sheds of the honey sellers. This is what you made us to be, it is how we became skeleton in our memories and talking to a father who made us became somehow rowdy and sometimes we scream and curse and clap our hands knowing very well that those pastors that were said are called by God told us to do so. It is how men and women became thirsty on the tongues of sweet neglects. Like one time, a boy and a girl were raped like a moth-eaten blouse slipping off from a woman's shoulder just how every day explains how tailored the tears of a boy child and a girl child, a man and a woman become once its drops from their eyes and you were nowhere to be found to rescue them not even their fellow human came to rescue them.
You walked on oceans, i stretched into my body into your eyes, we both wanted to see what it really meant to be called a God; one small, one big. To course through the skin of a sky or float into the windpipe of yesterday when we were still blood and water will have us thinking like we once existed here. Tell me, is there really Hellfire? Is there really ghost? Is there really spirit? Is there really Satan? How did the fight of the growing gods broke out in heaven? Who were the judges, Angels? I am confused here just like everyone else. The African traders are home now, all wailing of their lost sons and daughters whom they will never see again. The street has ceased to accommodate us, it’s deserted. What are our offenses? They said human blood had redesigned their bodies. Tell me, why do you allow much blood to spill all over the place? And those who were killed without their knowledge of it, will they still go to hell fire to be burned?. Your skin our iris, is a monument, is a collection of fire of anguish to burn us all till eternity. We burn, you gnash like a father watching his children dying silently. This is not what every book called a lover's God should contain.
They said it is not everything I find here that looks like you but you created them all. They said you are white or Pink or what have you, who does Africans look like, Ape? But you created us in your Image isn’t it? I am confused here! Totally confuse but it is a mystery why we are here.
Remember, Ogba is still sick of pile. Yesterday, a prophetess laid hand on him to be healed and gave him holy water to drink but he is still hoping for healing. Remember he must not die on the 4th of May. He must not die just like Mary died. You have to bless him and make him the light you promised. He has to bring his family to the lime light, he has to.
I may not be able to share kola nut with you as it is being done in the heart of Igbo men when they gather to deliberate on the issue hurting them. I may not be able to render some praises to you at this moment because of the urgency tailored for my voice to be hearkened.
Maybe we’ll switch places and find peace somewhere without the gospel or maybe we hold the gospel waiting for that glorious day of the coming or the last day between death and life.
We’ve been friends even as my mother conceived me. You told her that you love me. You told her that everything that concerns me touches you in the heart. You told her that you knew me even before she conceived me. You said to her: that my expectation shall not be cut off by any man or any woman. You said to her, that you are my pillar and my fortress and my strong tower and nothing is too hard for you to do for me. I know you as you knew me right from the beginning of time immemorial. Then, why has the mountain failed to move? Why is the pillar holding the world shaking? Why is the world basking on my weaknesses? Why has evil triumph over me? Where are you? Where is your will? Why are your ears too far from my words? Why don't you command this sickness out of the way? Why have they tormented us this far like we have no father above? Why free the Devil to use us like he wants? Why? Why? I ran to mother in the deadly hours of the night, I saw her in supplication to no one else but you.
I saw that Chinedu was still sick. I saw tears in the face of Father, father whose mighty hands built the church cathedral. I could remember when he said that you told him to give all his best and he gathered some of his brothers and sisters and sold the whole lands he inherited from his father. He gave the proceeds to the church of God according to the prophecy. He called it a seed, yes, he called it a seed to God and we all believed him because he believed in you. He was mocked by all but he waited. He waited for you to answer him but you were far, far from him. maybe the time has not come, maybe, he might be lucky if he waits a little longer. You were not there to rescue him when sickness came. You were not there to rescue him when he had an accident. You should have averted the accident to somewhere else because he pays his tithe and gives his offering. Father’s favourite line from the holy Book says that:
“…And you will devour the devourer and the cankerworms…”
That was the lines we grew up hearing him quote each time he was counting his tithe and whenever he paid his tithe. You were not there to heal his second daughter Chikamso. She died in pains of Cancer and was buried while you watched from heaven.
Meanwhile, father trusted in you. You said that those that trusted in you will never be put to shame but he did. Look at mother in supplication every now and then. She had made the kitchen her home. The kitchen where the memories of Chikamso started, the kitchen where she first collapsed, the kitchen where Kambili died; the kitchen where her dog was poisoned; the kitchen where she birthed Mary, her memories started right here in the kitchen not in the bedroom but here where seeking for freedom is the deadliest thing that ever happened to mankind. Nothing is worth anything to a dead man, not even his money. It is how boys were raped and we could not see God come to their rescue in the midst of many deadly torments and torture. It is how girls were abused and we could not lay hands on the mercy of God rather his words came before the sun of the day to hurt us fiercely on our craving skins. It is how we were taking into exile and the spirit of God was nowhere to be found. It is how our brothers and sisters were killed on the gory land called Nigeria. We could not find God in their midst yet, we believed that he is ever present to us.
Mother is still in the kitchen, father is still holding on tears just like what the society told him that a man must not cry because he is a man, that a man must not show his weaknesses because he is a man. God, now that Mary is no more here to sing of how great you are, our mouths are ceased of praises. How could you have allowed Mary to leave us here alone? How could you have allowed her to journey alone in the void places holding no one by her side? Who would then sing in this morning devotion? Who would then raise a song of praises to you without holding back his tears? We are all dying, and we must all die if Mary did not return home. Maybe death is the safest place to lay down ourselves till eternity. Her smiling portrait rests on the heart of every one of us, capped with a lonely empty feeling. How could you’ve allowed death to snatch her away from us? How could you have allowed her the freedom to paradise without first consulting her? You further made her pass through pains and sorrow before you took her away. Why?
Now, who will go to church with her Bible to worship you? Who will then clap hands like her in the church if she did not return? Is Cruelty served in your plate? You took her down so bitterly with no complain; agony randomly blue ticked all her texts. She endured the pains and wished for the best but the best never came to her. Even when the world within her was at rest, no favors, and no gains, just a troublesome quest, but wait, why do we run to you after being frightened? Why do we forget you’re the same God that cares nothing about us in this side of the world? Why do we pray if not for it to be answered? The Demons use us here like we were some rolls of paper, like we were a blunt meant to be finished but make sure their feelings were satisfied, they use us like a peddler, only when they need us.
Should I tell papa to go to the altar and take back the money he sowed as a seed for the wellbeing of Mary? Should I tell mother to stop fasting or to go to church and request for her car that she sowed as an offering for Mary’s recovery? Anyways, you are still God with or without those things and us. You are still there as God and no one can question your authority as they rightly said. But, I am bringing this to you that Satan is not at rest and you should not be at rest also. If Mary after all she had done in the house of God could die then life itself is meaningless to every human being. Having this thought all day long makes me think of losing myself to the wind. It makes me want to rest myself in the vacuum of lonely days till the trumpet will sound for Christ to come to our rescue if possible. Tomorrow sounds good and poisonous defining the art through which we were made. Tomorrow is a school of thought with the definition of unknown and you know you made it so. If only we could number our days here on earth; man will be better than he is now. If only tomorrow is known to us, man would learn how to manage himself to the fullest but tomorrow is unknown.
Papa has being on a wheel chair for the past fifteen years. He had an accident doing your work. Sister Amaka has not given birth for the past ten years and she is among the pastors in the church. She counseled a sister who wanted to abort her child yesterday. Later today, she heard that the same sister has ended up aborting the child. I know your time is the best but she is being mocked by people she is better than. They looked straight into her eyes and mock her aggressively. Even those she called sons and daughters in the Lord mock her also. We were told that the devil locked up her womb because she is a Christian. Is that so? Where are you, God?
Brother Ezeugo lost his job last year because he was caught preaching the gospel to one of his coworkers. We all know that these are temptations to show your supremacy over all things but you are still God with or without all these temptations. And now Ogba is suffering of pile…! I know you know about this but, when will all this end? Should we switch places and find peace somewhere else? Should we tell them that you are no longer God? Should we continue to plead that we may be called humans? No!
Yesterday, I was in the church again and the man of God spoke about heaven and hell. He taught us about paradise on earth and an ensnaring hell fire for sinners. He said there is a Hell fire waiting for all sinners, those who disobeyed God. I was surprise hearing this again. I was astonished of how a lovely father would punish his children in the lake of fire because of disobedient. I was wondering why but I could not get an answer to the question. I wonder how you will feel seeing your children that you created burn and scream for help from the fire. Would you just close your eyes and ears for us to burn till eternity or would you quash the fire when you have mercy on us or would you just allow us to perish? If so, why did you create us, for you to burn us like that?
When Mary was alive, she was a chorister. Later, she was ordained as a pastor and she was up and doing. She did all that she could to put smiles on people’s faces. She won many souls to the kingdom and was called mother Theresa of our generation. She built many foundations where the motherless and the orphans could be taken care of but after all, she died as a no body.
She died just like a fowl. She asked that I suck her memories away; she asked that I be her eyes, so i began from the beginning of her making until she gave up the ghost— i touched her like feathers on the wings of a seabird on the day she gave up as a human. She floated and ached in my bones but I asked for peace but it was far away from me. Peace which no one could give but only you. I shivered and woke in her skin, i nibbled into her nipples but all was lifeless to the core. I and her mother and her father moaned looking at her face lying on the bed. Her spirit taught us how to run, to disallow little demons from telling us how her vagina looks like. I think you know all of this. I know you know them all, God. Life has taught us to wear the cloths of our fathers and that of misery — "riches are never available” that was what misery told us. Life said that we should be scarce; we cannot cut our heart for a river flowing with dismissal. Life is a docile, a door less room where everything escape at will. Life is a misery only known to it by itself.
Let’s learn how to plant our lips only on our mouth day and night so that we could suck out mother and her mother’s dirge and her father's mother elegy before the black goats go into the dark night to look for yams to misuse. Let’s turn our hands into a song from which your mouth ache again and again at your inabilities. We are all humans learning to throw ourselves to the world like our kites dangling to wind songs without holding anything as a common desire to hurt others of their misfortunes. In the terrain of blue skies, we will become tired humans learning to empty our wisdoms through the names of the grave but before then, let’s knit to our father's names to look for why our prayers take time to be answered and why we die and where we could find death. How do you think you carve the name of death after you die? On the sand towers? On the bridge of hope or on the bodies of the skies?
God, do you know I gave myself big eyes and big dreams and big faiths and big distance and bigger height just like the Egyptian’s pyramid? Do you know that when time becomes darkness we must beat with torchlight? I may not likely tell you that I am not asking, you know I have being asking and waiting for the answer; no Raven remain in the sky to convey my messages to you, none. I seek the boldness of the wind to take my pleas to you so that life will not make me feel like a fatherless when you are still alive. Just in case I misstep, just in case I no longer dream; just in case I may think of losing it all, just us in separate worlds dancing in the wind.
It is how I and father and mother and the remaining brothers of mine took the stairs in our lives with bowties of everyday barriers because the songs of human are a case in the courtyard of perpetuity. There are stories in the eyes of those boys who went and never came back to this world. There are somehow prices in the eyes of those women and men who are murdered every day in our streets? There are untold tales in the mouths of those our brothers and sisters who were killed by terrorist groups and herdsmen! There are many stories, dear God. Why were they brought to this world in the first place? Why are we here? To drink, produce and die?
Flinging mangoes against the window netting and making the electric wires hit each other and spark bright orange flames, is how men and women are lured into brokenness, because each time day breaks, it reminds men to work harder and toil more than the veins in their bodies because sweating is how a man poses and take pictures to remind himself of how he started. This is how our stories are told anywhere where the world is said to be round and flat. Every day, the human race is scrunched up with the noses at the smell of bloody fresh meat and musty dried fish and their heads are lowered from the bees that buzzed in thick clouds over the sheds of the honey sellers. This is what you made us to be, it is how we became skeleton in our memories and talking to a father who made us became somehow rowdy and sometimes we scream and curse and clap our hands knowing very well that those pastors that were said are called by God told us to do so. It is how men and women became thirsty on the tongues of sweet neglects. Like one time, a boy and a girl were raped like a moth-eaten blouse slipping off from a woman's shoulder just how every day explains how tailored the tears of a boy child and a girl child, a man and a woman become once its drops from their eyes and you were nowhere to be found to rescue them not even their fellow human came to rescue them.
You walked on oceans, i stretched into my body into your eyes, we both wanted to see what it really meant to be called a God; one small, one big. To course through the skin of a sky or float into the windpipe of yesterday when we were still blood and water will have us thinking like we once existed here. Tell me, is there really Hellfire? Is there really ghost? Is there really spirit? Is there really Satan? How did the fight of the growing gods broke out in heaven? Who were the judges, Angels? I am confused here just like everyone else. The African traders are home now, all wailing of their lost sons and daughters whom they will never see again. The street has ceased to accommodate us, it’s deserted. What are our offenses? They said human blood had redesigned their bodies. Tell me, why do you allow much blood to spill all over the place? And those who were killed without their knowledge of it, will they still go to hell fire to be burned?. Your skin our iris, is a monument, is a collection of fire of anguish to burn us all till eternity. We burn, you gnash like a father watching his children dying silently. This is not what every book called a lover's God should contain.
They said it is not everything I find here that looks like you but you created them all. They said you are white or Pink or what have you, who does Africans look like, Ape? But you created us in your Image isn’t it? I am confused here! Totally confuse but it is a mystery why we are here.
Remember, Ogba is still sick of pile. Yesterday, a prophetess laid hand on him to be healed and gave him holy water to drink but he is still hoping for healing. Remember he must not die on the 4th of May. He must not die just like Mary died. You have to bless him and make him the light you promised. He has to bring his family to the lime light, he has to.
I may not be able to share kola nut with you as it is being done in the heart of Igbo men when they gather to deliberate on the issue hurting them. I may not be able to render some praises to you at this moment because of the urgency tailored for my voice to be hearkened.
Maybe we’ll switch places and find peace somewhere without the gospel or maybe we hold the gospel waiting for that glorious day of the coming or the last day between death and life.