PEOPLE IN THE COCOON

Turmoil and struggle, resignation and submission- these are the things that we face each day. There are those – very few of them - that truly fight back. They fight with all their might; arms and all. We sit and ponder ‘why can’t they fight in silence like we do?’ we watch as they destroy themselves in hope that their fight would yield good fruits; as they surrender all to their cause.
We pay tributes with our lips and with our buttocks, sit still – holding fast to our soft cushions. We watch the aggression of our brothers in the Delta, Kenya, Sudan, Rwanda and outside the continent but we clamour only for peace. ‘Peace is good.’ We say to ourselves.

Boko Haram popped out of the northern air and our feathers were ruffled, Clinton said her piece and some of us gnarled at her. Instead of learning from others and from experience we fight things that do not need fighting. Who started this Boko Haram? Who had Bayo Ohu killed? Who are those really behind these things? Don’t sit and ask, shout at those who can give us answers, force their mouths open. Corruption cannot be fought with peace, or can it?

As we sit, wonder and sigh, thought of our needs consume us. We want electricity, we want good roads, and we want water, jobs and security. We want our children safe and though we crave desperately for all these things, yet our buttocks, brown and round, remain buried in our soft cushions.

The fans above our heads do not roll, we cannot do much work and we are impoverished yet we sit and shout ‘give us our due.’ We don’t want to get up because half bread is better than none and we are afraid of the loss that comes with contest. We could lose our homes and peace of mind, we justify our inactions. We also have to think of our children and what may become of them. We hope a lot and we like to live in peace.
Hope is good and peace is good too so we look forward to them for we are convinced they will come someday. In the mean time – that could mean forever – we strategize, adapt and endure.

Some say to us ‘Ko ti de oju e’ – It has not reached the eyes yet. So we sit since there is no fire under our butts. We the people in the cocoon are peaceful and hopeful.