Bye Bye Blog...

If I see tomorrow,
I’ll never see 20 again!
I am tired of being.
I no longer want to be.
Here.

This is an end.
The End...

Let the darkness come,
and with it, a death.
May the dawn break
So my soul can have her rebirth...

1008; A Fluttering Leaf from my Journal

I don’t think about him, people expect me to but I don’t and I don’t find it weird that I don’t, not at all. I don’t miss him, or what we had, all that talk about your first love, well its not true, or maybe I’m just a freak.
I thought about him today, this evening, as I sat in there. I go there at least once a week and I don’t think about him. I don’t know why today was different. I thought about him today and it was because of them. I’ve seen them there before, the two of them, him; very cute and boyish, her; tall, slim, cute, sexy. I saw them again today and I thought about him.
I had to suppress a sudden violent urge to stand up and walk up to them, ask him to excuse us so I could talk to her. I wanted to tell her how that was me, that was my yesterday, she is me last year. I wanted to tell her. Tell her that it wouldn’t last, that they might be laughing now but very soon the fights would start, the fights that had no ending. I had to force myself not to go over.
I wanted to ask him for how long he thought they would last. I wanted to tell them not to give too much of their hearts to each other.
I thought about him, how that used to be us. Teasing, smiling, laughing, just sitting there. How that used to be us that’d walk into the eatery and joke with everyone there coz it was our hang out, but its no longer us. Nature abhors a vacuum. There is no vacuum. There is no us. They took our space. I don’t mind. For me I don’t. For the cute boy and the sexy girl, I do. I want to tell them about the frowns that’ld soon crease their faces and how it would end with them not even being friends. I want to tell her to run before she gives him her all. I want to tell her to make sure tomorrow never comes. Because when the dawn breaks, she will be me today.
I don’t miss him. I miss some of the things we used to do. The silly meaningless calls a zillion times a day. I miss the silence. The one filled with laughter. The one where I could still hear the love; loud and clear. I don’t miss the silence that came at the end. The one filled with the fights and anger. No I don’t miss that silence. I don’t miss him. I don’t think about him. I don’t feel guilty that I’ve moved on, that there’s been someone else since almost immediately after him. No I don’t. I don’t feel guilty that less than 2 months ago he still told * he couldn’t believe I was gone. I don’t.
I want to tell her about how the paths they walk together today she will skip along tomorrow. Alone. I want to tell her to run and not look back. I want to tell her that love sucks. It sucks away all of your innocence. When tomorrow comes she will no longer be able to recognize love. I want to tell her about how I’m fighting so hard to accept love these days. How I can no longer hear love when its screaming. How my silence no longer rings with love. I want to tell her love always hurts. How she will give him her all and have it not work out. How she would leave and then he’d see what she’d been screaming in his face for years. I want to tell her love always hurts. I want to pull her away from him.
I don’t. I listen instead to the sound of their laughter, I watch her tickle him. I watch him hold her. I listen to the sound of their joy, I watch, I listen. I hope that for them, tomorrow delays, just a little bit longer. Because when tomorrow comes she will no longer remember what his smile looks like. He will no longer come here because it reminds him of her. She will come though. Alone. I don’t think about him. I don’t miss him.
I turn, allowing Coldplay’s ‘Fix you’ waft over me, letting it soothe wounds I thought had become scars. I bury my face in Biyi Bandele’s ‘The Street’, finding my laughter once more, in Nehushta’s little trick…

p.s. forgive me if this does not read easily. it is straight from the folder journal (diary if you like)and this is the disjointed, repetitious way I write in it. I am jaded.

BITTER WATERS

My name is Amara but everybody calls me Mara. A few months after I was born, the preacher down the road preached to my mother (that was years before he became one of her customers); heaven knows what the contents of his message because the only thing my mother latched onto was the word ‘Marah’. She began to call me Mara saying it suited me. Mara, for the biblical bitter waters. Mara, because my mother said I was the beginning of her troubles. Mara, because I am unloved.

When I was 10 years old, my class teacher asked me what my hobby was.
Hobby?
Yes, hobby; what you do in your spare time.
I measure drinks and roll Igbo (weed).

He beat me; he said I had a smart mouth. It was the truth, that I measure drinks I mean. By that time I knew very well how to help my mother ply her trade in illicit gin and other concentrated spirits, I also knew well how to dodge the dark, filthy fingers of drunk and not so drunk men pulling at my lime-like breasts, and to keep out of reach of their angry kicks.

My mother sells concentrated spirits; she is what is commonly called a paraga seller. We live in her shop; a shanty made of wood, about 8ft by 10ft, adjoined to 4 other such. We are the only ones on that line of shanties who live in it though, the others only sell; roasted corn, food, and there is the shoe maker. From the outside, the entire row looks as though the next wind that blows will knock it down. The inside, is a cold, dark earthy grave into and from which broken men wander at intervals because when my mother is not selling drinks, she is on her back, spreading her legs for one of her customers. Her corner is by the right, a thick mattress placed on the floor, her box of clothes and arrangement of drinks across from the bed, all behind a veil which pretends to conceal, while revealing all, coyly, like a new prostitute.

This slum-like street is fertile ground for my mother’s trade, filled as it is with jobless young men who grow into addicted old men escaping their homes. They come to my mother; to gamble, to drink, to fight, to smoke, to drown their dead heads in drinks and escape the perceived chains that bind them. My mother is their savior, the witch giving them the elixir that keeps them alive. It helps that she does not touch the stuff she sells, that she cares for her body with a reverence no one around for miles can fathom. It helps that she looks better than their wives.

During the day, I am a 15 year old student at the best school around, with clean uniforms and neatly polished shoes. The one who gets to school first and leaves last but yet has no friends. School is where I get away, where I read and lose myself in the books. I am the one nobody talks to because they think I’m weird, I do not paint my nails or wear lip gloss, a driver does not pick me up from school, I do not know how to hold a conversation. My head is always buried in a book and I get perfect grades. If my mother cannot love me, why should I expect school mates to? I am Mara.

In the evenings, I measure drinks, roll, and light weed. There is no play time; playing dodge from the groping fingers of the men does not, cannot count. I live a busy life, trying to hide my breasts and the new sway in my hips from the roving eyes.

The first time he came to me was yesterday, he came when all had gone and my mother had just closed for the day 11:30 pm. I thought he was drunk and coldly told him my mother’s corner was at the other end; let her tell him she was closed for the day. He smiled, he smelled, sweet and nice, he smiled, knelt and caressed my arms where I lay and told me it was me he came to see. I jerked up, ready to run for Mama, this wasn’t the first time some drunk fool would try this but he held me down. I screamed for Mama. She did not come running with the metal pole she kept for the unruly ones, neither did she chase him and give me a stare accusing me of trying to steal her customer especially one as rich looking as this. The dull glint of gold on his neck and wrist betrayed him.

I stopped fighting, I watched in disbelief, an unwilling spectator as he ripped my clothes. I screamed like a legion of demented souls banished to hell. Mama did not come. Because. Because I am Mara. Because I am unloved.

I closed my eyes and went inside my head, where I could not see his mad eyes boring into my soul, where I could not feel his heavy body trapping me like a fallen baobab trunk, where I couldn’t smell my fear or his primal excitement.

I do not know for how long I closed my eyes, I only knew he was gone with his final words floating in the wind.
I promise tomorrow will be better. It wont hurt you then. Sweet, good little girl.

I lay, eyes scrunched tight, curled into myself like a fist and prayed, hoping that when I opened my eyes it would all be a dream. It wasn’t, my sore thighs told me so, my vagina which felt like someone had reached in with the devil’s own poker like forked tail and lit a fire, the blood, dried and matted on my pubic hair and legs, my gown which lay around me in strips, all told me it was reality, my reality.

He is a big government man. He came last week, threatening to call the police task force to bulldoze her shanty. Mama offered him money, drinks, her lithe body, all that she thought she had, but he would have none of it. The man came in a big car, (the same big car that sometimes followed me from school in the past month), he would have none of it he told mama. He wanted me; the only thing that was of no value to her. Besides the one that brought me about was much worse than what I just had. It was high time I started earning my keep.

I don’t know if she was speaking to herself, or if the words were meant for my ears but she could not stop talking after he left. I lay, seemingly oblivious to her words. When I woke up this morning, Mama was drunk.

I cleaned up myself this morning and put on my face; the one I wear everyday, the one that masks the world, the war raging inside of me. I put on my face and measured drinks, rolled weed. I cleaned, I cooked, I bought meat from the butcher. I measured drinks and rolled weed, inhaling, reveling in the familiar smell. I waited.

Darkness came. I love to watch it fall, the way it hangs like a thick heavy cloak weighing down the earth’s shoulders.

I lay pliant when he came tonight, Mama’s words ringing in my head. I held my knife, the one I stole from the butcher this evening, under my wrapper folds. I waited.

Into the thick, fatty folds of his stomach I plunged before he landed atop me. Once. Twice. I blocked out the shock on his face and the rising scream with my pillow as I rolled out from beneath him. I did not wait to hear him breathe his last as I grabbed my mother’s purse from beneath my mattress. Not the purse where she keeps her daily take, no, the bag like one where she keeps her savings because she believes bankers are thieves, I took it earlier from her box, she did not know I knew about it. I ran, stumbling as I walked out the door, barely registering my mother’s trade mark snore as I knocked down a bottle of what smelt like gin and hoped she did not hear. Out the door, I tripped over the lantern, lone sentry at the door, and ran into the night.

I stopped as I heard the explosion; concentrated spirits igniting, raging, hell’s demons on rampage consuming all in their path. No more will I bring sorrow to my mother. No more will I be called Mara. I fled, into the outstretched hands of darkness.

1. 3rd mainland bridge from unilag lagoon front.
2. this is what happens when i'm 4cd 2 cook
3. boredom induced.
4. daddy's room. not his library oh. room
5. earthworm.
6. rag day in sciences
7. animal rights?
8. another rag day
9 & 10. sarcasm?
11. view from sciences.
5,6,7,8,11 taken by my baybee bro

DELIVERANCE (POETRY)

let's have a pentecost;
a turmoil of tongues
leaping
tongues of flame
to purge this
soul


wondering,
wandering
words


flashes,
distorted images
Racing
in
my
Head!
a m i l l i o n p i e c e s o f a j i g s a w
scattered bits floating in the wind

wandering,
wondering.


No padded walls
No strait jackets
for this demented soul.
Asylum. This body.
trapped for an eternity.
breath shortening,
choking!

no more.


There is no tomorrow,
only yesterdays of sorrow.
As shattered dreams pierce my sole,
like thorns driven into my blackened soul.

hv no idea wat this is abt btw. please check out Chizitere.

FUNLOLA DIED

She died in December and I only just heard yesterday evening; saw her sister and asked her ‘how is Funlola, haven’t been seeing her and not getting through to her phone?’ she said ‘didn’t you know Funlola died in December, I thought you knew’ I can’t stop wondering, how can Funlola be dead.

I met Funlola Bakinson in November 2004, when I had to re-write s.s.c.e; for a year she was my partner in crime, she was my Bliss and Reni rolled in 1, she was the one I got into trouble with a lot of teachers in the school with, she was the one I gossiped with, gisted with, played with, laughed with, expressed my frustrations to. I dreamed with her and in that year we were close, so close we’d see each other Monday to Friday and still talk during starcomms free calls on Saturday and Sunday evenings. My equally petite friend (I don’t know who was thinner in both of us), with the glasses and her hand gestures and God, I can hear her voice in my head, see her habits now, we called her ‘Baki’.

She had sickle cell anemia, we grew apart after school sec school, rare calls but when we chanced to see, we’d gist and laugh together and then she got into lag the year I got into year three and coz she stayed in Moremi too, she’d come over to get novels, watch movies on my laptop and just gist. I tried calling her, wasn’t getting through, I never imagined she was dead, never imagined that was why I hadn’t seen her since the beginning of this year, I thought she was just in a different hostel, till I saw her sister and asked about Funlola.

I haven’t cried in months, never cried for a death, and never had anyone I was that close to die. I got into my room and broke down, had to let it out, had to get past it and I found in my tears that amidst the repeated ‘how can Funlola be dead’ running around in my head, I was crying for others, for my 10year old family friend who’s been lying ill in the hospital since January coz he’s got sickle cell anemia, for one of my two best girl friends; Bliss, who has sickle cell and though she looks healthier than Reni and I, sometimes has unexpected attacks, like the day she suddenly fell while crossing the road and couldn’t get up but was lucky enough some guy in the gawking crowd rushed to pick her up just before a car went by. I was crying for the pain they feel coz of their genes, crying because Funlola never got to turn 21, because she’s not going to walk delicately by my side, by anyone’s side ever again, because we’re never going to have a passionate argument or even a girl talk together anymore. I was crying, hard sobs that shook my whole body, and when the tears stopped, I didn’t want them to; I wanted to cry away my pain, my hurt, my frustrations, my questions, my helplessness.

She was the last child of her parents, can’t imagine how they must have felt. She was a good person, a good friend, God, what kind of friend am I if I didn’t know for 5 months? What kind of world is this where beautiful, young people with so much ahead of them go thru pain and die? I want to cry my sadness away but the tears won’t flow anymore, so I’m writing; for Funlola, my dear friend who didn’t get to live the possibilities ahead of her, for my Aunty Kemi who had only 2years of her marriage before she lost the fight, for Papa, who’s gone thru so much pain in his short life, more pain than I could ever imagine, so much pain that all of us around him hurt for him, for Papa’s mom who lost her 1st son and has to watch her last fight thru so much pain, for Khadijat who came to school one Thursday in Jss3 and died on Friday, for Bliss who has to take drugs almost everyday and who gets tired so easily when we have a girls’ day out, for all those who go thru so much pain because they or their loved ones have got sickle cell anemia.

I’m crying for myself, coz I’ve known 4 too many deaths this year alone, I’m crying because this is the first time I’ve been able to. Writing because that and crying is the only way I know to let things go but God it hurts so fucking bad I want to go somewhere and rail at the heavens, but most of all I want to not feel pain, not feel hurt because I can’t bear it, because I feel lyk tomorrow is somehow diminished, somehow marred by the death of the beautiful people I have know. I can’t handle this grief, I’m falling apart at the seams, my head aches so much right now I want to curl up in a corner and not feel. I can’t sleep, I can’t block the thoughts out of my head, I want to be able to block out the knowledge and not feel. By tomorrow, I have to not feel, I can’t afford to feel, to fall apart anymore than I already have…

I can’t believe Funlola died, I don’t want to accept it, don’t want to think about why God let it happen. I don’t want to know that Funlola died, I don’t want Funlola to be dead. I don’t want people to be in pain, I don’t want Funlola to be dead. I don’t. I hope she’s in a good place now, somewhere where there’s no pain and people don’t hurt through no fault of theirs…

HER

i don't like to remember her,
the girl who clung and hung,
the one who had dreams of forever...

and when she felt it slipping,
how she turned into ice...

but when the sun came out,
she wouldn't melt no more.
i don't like to remember her;
the girl i used to be.

Strange Addiction

these days i've been getting hooked on the strangest songs, my roomies think i'm bonkers when i start singing stuff lyk 'fokasibe' in my horrible voice, or 'koni koni love', orr 'pass me ur love' (this one actually has a line that's as dumb as 'she say i dey smoke too much igbo, e no mean oh'), 'shayo' (i looooovvvveee this one. the vid rocks), 'Bumper to bumper', 'yankuliyan' nd all d other 'mad' 9ja songs, even Wande Coal's 'Taboo'. i have them all on my lappie, i listen to them all the time, alongsyd my normal Enya, Sade, Dido, the corrs... these songs don't fit, my playlists look wack these days but i'm addicted. i get this silly smile on my face when i hear 'fokasibe' and i start singing along, my mom used to get pisd about it when i was home or 'alanta'; that one takes the cake for stupidity nd the vid is so hilarious...
it feels so odd, oh i'm also loving Darey's 'not the girl' nd 2face's 'Fly', Naeto's 'ashawo' and M.I i'm an M.I freak, i no fit shout!
its 2:15 am, never mind what my blog time says, i'm too bored to read school books, i've been hopping blogs and liisteningg to music, ryt now its Durella singing 'enu oshe', whateva that means...
i'm still blocked, heelp someone, my pink journal is seriously beefing me, so is microsoft word...

Mismatched

I'm wondering why people are so quick to tag others; 'loose, proud, bitchy, snob...' the list is endless. I find myself doing it sometimes but I'm quick to cut myself short though coz most times i remember tags that have been attached to me too. There's this chic in class, her clique is the kind about which you think, 'if they were white, they'd be blonde', so i thought till i got to know her on a deeper level. We're not friends but i got to know a different person from the one i always thot and honestly i was ashamed of my past thots about her.

just because she dey my video... e no mean say the girl na ashawo

its horrible when the person being labelled gets to know about it; for some, it rolls off their backs (a roomie calls them the 'awon da?' type; people who dont give a hoot about haters), some others begin to see themselves in that light, yet some get bitter about it and take it out on other people. I have been called all sorts; 'bitchy', asked all sorts; 'could you be any colder?'(this one particularly rankled coz the chic who said it is thot to be, well... cold).

I remember the first time I heard the bitch word used in relation to me; Omolarah came and told me how some chic in another faculty had come to ask her about me (name, surname nd all), saying she heard i was a very bitchy person. I felt lyk wow, excuse me? but shrugged it off, my faculty peeps don't even know me (or so i thought) so where did she get the crap from, only to get it from a couple of faculty guys (one hurt real bad, the other i thought, wtf hater?)

Does holding yourself apart from people make you cold? Does not giggling at stupid stuff and not taking crap from people make you a bitch? I dont think so!

I know there are times I'm in my hazy moods and I don't notice people or things but is that snobbery? a roomie couldn't stop talking about how surprised she was that we were getting along coz she thot I was snobbish and that there were tyms i'd snobbed her in the faculty. now i wonder, and she probably does too, if i snobbed her or if she just felt snubbed. There's a difference isn't there, people seeing what they want instead of what is.

i might be the way everybody likes to say, i know what you're thinking about me...

I cant write this honestly without talking about my faults too, rmb those hazy moods I talked about, well they can be really bad. I remember meeting Laolu sometime last year; i had a farafina mag with me and he asked if I write. we got chatting, got on so well I was surprised when he asked me what made this time different from the other times he'd tried to talk to me.
I went 'we've neva met'
'we have, twice before, he said, first tym you just walked out of the faculty lounge when i spoke to you, the second time, you flung your name at me and stalked out again'

I think my jaw musta dropped, I could almost swear it wasnt me. so, I got to making a conscious effort to keep my head present in faculty when my body is there but did it change anything, nope, I still get to hear the back talk.

see, I don't need anyone liking me, I just need people to not think I am someone I'm not but I guess some people just live such boring lives that the only way to spice it up is to modify other's lives and talk nonsense about them. Its wrong to assume stuff about people, yeah i know with some people, who they are is so obvious (once labelled someone a BWITCH (bitch + witch) and i still think she deserved it) but most times the tags are in relation to people we don't even know much about, people we only know from a distance. Its wrong, it hurts people and i think its just plain spiteful!

Haters they don't like me coz they ain't got it like me...

so i haven't had my lappie with me for a while, no lappie means i haven't been writing so i haven't been updating, also coz i only check my mails nd facebook via d phone these days nd celtel charges too much when i try to load blogs. see, i'm on holiday so i'm broke, the two always go together abi. no school, no allowie!
btw 'm in a cybercafe ryt now, i h8 them cafes coz its filled with u know them YY kind of boys plus ryt now there's this guy telling the chic selling tickets that if no be say them no dey beat women for im village e for break her head. nice one. were oshi.
shld be back by the end of the week sha...