For your days fall to the wails of the wild
Like fresh luscious leaves dropping dead
From wilting woods that pecker dread
The warring worms have eaten your face
Down to a dense fragment of disgrace
For years abound to mock the wisdom of age
As toddling tongues leap loose; their wills to engage
The shrewd screams of old mouths fall for nothing
To young errant ears that know everything;
Frail flowers that blossom into trees
As fast as the stings of desperate bees
Will my voice ever flow into your veins
Cleansing your youthful heart from lustful rains
That fall on the black banks of corrupt flesh
Into heedless minds that dare to enmesh?
Where are the days when pretty girls sat
To hear the rhythm of mother’s mat?
Where are the days when little boys drank
After their father – head of the rank?
Are the times alive; when the sheep lay
Meek and lowly as the shepherds pray,
Humming the tunes that the lost past, sang
As loud as the bells that aged arms rang?
Indeed! There are no children these days
For they know better the grown-up ways,
Leading their awed fathers by the hand;
Men who first saw the shape of the land
Written by: Chinazom Otubelu
Edited by: Kukogho Iruesiri Samson
