The centre will not hold
For it is clay
Made of dust and some
spittle
And so it will
succumb
To the pressures that
life suppresses it with
It will cower and
feel threatened
And slowly it will
give in
Bowing to mediocrity,
averageness and whatever life offers
For it couldn’t hold.
For it is mortal, made of
clay that disintegrates with time
The centre will not
hold
Debts will come in
From all the corners
of the earth
And they will lure
you
With sweet smiles and
fragrant scents
And you will bow; to
them
Giving in to a life
full of financial crises
Later you will feel
threatened,
Every friend becomes
a foe
They want a pound of
flesh from your jugular
And so you become
socially aloof
Hiding and avoiding
everyone
For your centre
refused to hold
The centre will not
hold
In class, you seem to
be the dumbest kid
You know nothing
And the nothing you
know, you do not know it well
And so the teachers
wonder what this cabbage is doing in class
It needs a knife, they
will say
And so they will
slice you
With taunts and
torment
You will of course
fall apart
The centre will not
hold
Your boss will squawk
at you
Pressure on top of
pressure till you feel like urinating
Worse still if you
have no job
The landlord and you
will be paraffin and water
You, the paraffin
because your pocket is lighter
At this, the centre
will crumble.
The centre will not
hold
All your
relationships turn to naught
The opposite sex sees
you and they turn away
They wouldn’t stand
to be associated with you
And so you feel that
your great grandfather displeased the gods
Maybe he didn’t break
the nine gourds at Uhuru Park as was
required
Maybe he broke only
eight and kept one for his killer brew.
Maybe he drank all muratina
during sherehes and forgot to
pour libation to the gods
And so, there you
are; dejected, lonely and feeling that life is unfair
Meaningless; like a
dead decaying log discarded into the middle of an ocean
And so you turn to
the brown bottle, because it offers plastic consolation.
Or better still you
test the rope. To see how taut it can be.
From the rooftop you
hang; Okonkwo style.
For your centre was
just a centre.
A mortal centre.
It wouldn’t hold.
But brother, why didn’t
you?
Introspect and wonder
the fabrication
Of this centre that
you pride in
Why didn’t you- look
and see its vanity
Why didn’t you,
acknowledge the one who moulded this centre
For his centre is
immortal
a very deep article with nice imagery.
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