These are excerpts from the book, “Streets & Corridors, The Untamed Narratives,” a collection of poems that offers an insightful glimpse into a world of unique struggles, aspirations, unease and fears of the everyday Nigerian
By Napoleon Esemudje
Blind Eyes
Overland
Dark clouds are drawn
Into the vortex
Of a frenetic gust
In the distance
Strained particles crack
With a vengeful clap
Its haunting echo
Seeks to rend
The fabric of
A sterile peace
But the lights
Have gone out
Of the eyes
Of this land
And it can see
No more than worms
The sprouting shadows
In the distance
Lost Gladiators
At a certain bus stop
Legions of Danfo headlights
Glare blindly at each other
In the predawn frontline
Of a grueling battle
For frenzied commuters
By the bushy wall
Of a street corner
Teenage miscreants intermittently
Answer manhood questions
With a smoke of red dust
And a roar of gunfire
Within the jumbled murmurings
Of a squalid market place
A man writhes in the ashes
Of his existence
Set ablaze by a clash of tongues
After long postures of co-existence
Against
The yellow glare of sunset
A door shudders resignedly
To a sudden anguished shriek
As a hand of grating steel
Slash down a kindred foe
Every odd day,
In the murky backyards
Of this wavering country
We walk, step in step
With the specter
Of lost gladiators
Napoleon Esemudje, a Chevening Scholar, is a versatile poet, storyteller, playwright, essayist, banker, management and human resources aficionado
