GREEN BLACK GREEN

GREEN, BLACK, GREEN.

How else can the singer sing?

How else can the writer write?

How else can the angry people demonstrate?

How else can we say what we’ve always said?

How else can we cry since reddened eyes, sore throats and bowed heads haven‘t said enough?

Silence…

Have you ever thought to give me an answer?

We are liars.

The flag has made us liars.

There is nothing green about a land covered with the brown goo of decaying bodies.

There is nothing white about souls that have lost innocence and water themselves with the tears of men.

There is nothing green about a land whose rivers are stained red with the blood of men whose sins were their attempt to do well.

There is nothing white- pure- about leaders who protect their children while the children of the poor are left to cannibalistic men like them, as prey.

There is nothing green about a land whose people have the same skin color yet find themselves repulsive because of more subtle differences.

There is nothing white about the soot-stained hearts of people who thrive on the ashen state of their neighbors, bruises of their wives and frustrations of their husbands.

There is nothing green about a land from which kindness seldom sprouts; a land dominated by the vices springing up everywhere like brown fungi.

There is nothing white about corruption; its blackened claws shredding hope, dreams and lives.

There is nothing green in this new kingdom save for the vegetation whose leaves are slowly turning yellow and brown.

Perhaps, for the sake of lifeless trees, we should let the green in the flag be.

There is nothing white at all; nothing white about a nation whose people’s words and actions scorch each other’s faces like the sun rays as they fall through the depleted ozone layer.

There is no white at all for even hope and the clouds are being darkened by unearthly sin.

The land once filled with the scent of innocence as little boys and girls played is now overflowing with adults whose fangs and hands are bloodstained.

How did we let all that purity be eaten up by greed, corruption, death and war?

It is time to wash our linen clean.

Let all the tears and blood rid the land of the filth that destroys it.

Let us cleanse their souls with our thoughts and actions.

Let us give those who died unjustly the justice of making their sacrifices good.

Let us salvage hope and feed her strong, wretched as she may be.

Let us fight until we can look at our flag billow and feel pride instead of the misery and guilt that we have thrust upon ourselves.

Let us become what we lie to the world that we are.

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY NIGERIA!!!

Cheers to "a brighter future"

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Don't get me wrong; I'm proud to be a Nigerian and I'm glad that things aren't worse than they are. I just think that sometimes, we need to tell ourselves the truth and stop celebrating mediocrity and things we know we don't have. Maybe today's for sitting down and thinking about what you can do to make our home better. Maybe today is for swallowing the hard pill so that tomorrow can be better.