Japheth J Omojuwa: SONG OF PAIN, PAIN WITHOUT END: My Lamentation written by Japheth J Omojuwa

My heart knows so much pain
So much pain my mind cannot fathom
Time tastes bitter and life like ewuro
Like ewuro I am told to expect some joy some day
The anguish my eyes see
The sights my sense feels
People moving and ending nowhere
Men working and earning nothing.
Ending nowhere and earning nothing
Living life through struggles
They know what to do
They know to do
They do
All their efforts end in nought
Children are living to die
Parents are dying to live
Fat thieves live on their common wealth
To share a common wealth they live in poverty
In poverty through an endless wealth
They are blessed or so it seems
Endless wealth it seems but cursed by their rulers
It seems by their rulers but I see the people
They know not, they care not
They want to live today without care for tomorrow
They care not for tomorrow, tomorrow comes
For tomorrow comes with pain and anguish
The day they see another flicker
They sing like they have a messiah
Their messiah turns another monster
Whether in khaki or in agbada
The people sing the same song
They start with hope
Their songs end in pain
They sing a song of pain
Doctors will not be resident
Teachers will not be scabs
Still the motor of a nation moves on
The nation moves on the path of agony
Mothers are dying fathers don’t want to live
Children are born to die
Adults die like they never were born
Death gets the blame when they die
Tell me what death kills a man without health and care
What death kills a child hunger kills
Death comes to them they care no more
They know already too many deaths
Roads have their traps
Work places are slave harbours
Homes are club houses
Darkness reigns supreme but light does blink
The plateau flows with blood
Yet people’s children are sent to their death
In service to the nation death serves them
I want to live
I want to think
To work my mind in production
To live for me, knowing survival means serving men
To live to think cannot be, without freedom
Without freedom men die as slaves
Five multiples of ten says the calendar
Yet our lives say we yet know no independence
Our lives are controlled from the center
The center of sleaze and moochers
The home of thieves who catch little thieves
Our future is traded in their chambers
They say our experiment is nascent
We ask how nascent is a decade?
A poor old farmer becomes President
In eight nascent years becomes a dollar sign billionaire
Nascent sounds like another home grown term
Another home grown term is our democracy
A democracy that has nothing for the people
Nothing for the people means not by the people
Not by the people means not of the people
If this is Lincoln’s democracy, is ‘Do or die’ its tenet?
Another cycle turns
Here they come in their numbers
You know it’s that time when people get killed
People get killed by armed robbers
By armed robbers who are armed not to rob
Who are armed not to rob but to kill? You know them
They are the foxes of the cannibals
The harbinger of battles for the soul of power
The soul of power that feeds on death
We shout our size -the biggest this and that
We forget to say we are big but for nothing
Africa calls for our lead yet we offer the motherland a giant
A giant too big to move, too big to lead
Hear their song of praise
In praise of thieves and murderers
When finally we see their coronation
Their song of praise becomes that of pain
Pain for hunger, the hunger they fed with gifts for votes
Gifts of votes becomes that of pain
Another four years to wait for another chance
Another chance comes without a chance for democracy
Old mind-tired men refuse to let youth lead
They cry about today like they knew not what they did yesterday
For democracy yesterday they truncated
Like God, they decided against the wish of the people
They look different
It’s their look, they are same in their heart
A heart that feels no joy
Men who feel no pain
Mind-tired men yet virile for more destruction
This is my song of pain
Pain for my people
For my people refuse to see
This is my song of pain
Pain for their rulers
For their rulers don’t know to lead
But only men to their death
Children to their early graves
Young people to destruction
A nation to shame and penury
A people without direction
Who will change my song?
Who will change the sound?
The time comes again
My people look to see
Only they see nothing but today
Tomorrow comes soon enough
Nothing but today they see
Soon enough to hear again
My song of pain
Their pain that knows no gain
No gain but cries, cries and sorrow, sorrow and tears
More blood in homes, men working without pay
Without pay they demand for something to vote
They forget that he gives a little to loot their future
Our Niger area has come so far
I wonder how far we have to go
Like that ewuro with its bitterness
I hope this bitterness ends like that of the bitter-leaf
Like the bitter-leaf, I hope my song ends in Joy.

PS: ewuro is the Yoruba term for bitter-leaf.