We saw a shadow, a shadow of death

Whose claws terrifying and uninviting

We saw a road, safe it appeared and to refuge lead

After a long exhausting and laborious walk

Soon, it was haven at last, we thought

Resounding sighs of relief, safe at last!

So thought the escapees.

The outer surface whitewashed and inviting

We once saw a shadow, a death’s shadow

We now see our death, caressing with claws

Claws once fared awaited us in haven so-called.

Are we dead?

Yes like a walking dead!

For what’s is life,

When liberty is tenuous?

Or what’s living,

Where destinies are killed?

What is food,

When like fowl we’re fed in the pen of dependence and hopelessness?

Being groomed until our days of usefulness are gone.

When families are set apart

And able fellows are disabled

When educated and skillfuls are silenced

And innocent’s are housed in detention

And liberty of guiltless confiscated

What’s life if breath’s without hope?

I behold the wailings

At the cemetery of destinies,

Where bright futures abruptly turn dismal

Where refuge seekers are turned to their deaths

And I ask,

Does anyone care?

As the clock’s hands ticks to our twilight

Then to our night,

And to our expiry;

When our days of usefulness are over?

Something’s crying

The yearning ceaselessly immutable

Like thirsty throat cherishes nothing but water

The treasures, the virtues, the skills

In our bellies swells and overt

Yet like protruding but painful kwashiorkor

Our bellies full but with malnourished talents

We look full? Nay, we’re fooled

Into thinking our days of usefulness are intact

That the hands of the clock are halted

Even as the span of our usefulness expires.

The bones of our destinies

Dead, buried, stunk and dried

Yes,  like hopeful saints await resurrection

The day our liberty restores

When the owners of our dangerous refuge remembers, we too like all aspire to grow

Until then, we’re all dead!

Until there emerges our saviour

Who feels the depth of our wound, our deadness

Who empathises the pains of our born and unborn,

Before the days of our usefulness are all gone.

Until then, we are dead

Until then, yes buried

With our destinies in the palm of our refuge.