I have sat to ponder on the present state of my world,
The home I live in,
Our little tents,
Where the whole of the human race lives.

Pirates have raided our tents
and shared our booty
Vampire mosquitoes have come and taken a share of our blood
The wind has roared maliciously
and hit the tiny rotten aluminums on which our tents stand

The terrible cold came
and snatched the breathes of comrades from our camp
Leaving us incomplete and amputated.

We feed from the large brown bowl
and drink from the lake at the backyard.
Those who take the first bite from the bowl esteem themselves as the elites
Some few persons after them are allowed
to tag along.

Those who receive only a morsel of bread or a lick of pap
are the Dregs
And everyone comfortably basks in the mediocrity that life gives us;
Where some wear wool as clothe
And others don’t have even a piece of cloth
To cover their nakedness.

Where tents rise against tents and grit their teeth against one another’s knees,
And scare off the peace amidst us
Where the larger tents watch the tattered tents tear apart,
With no compassion.
I shook my head because
Everyone is fine with this
And mother has told me
To stop questioning the order of things each time I complain about our city.

But the Hero in me will not let me be;
When I lay my head on my brown pillow at night,
I have dreams of a city full of stars
A kingdom free of predators
Free of sinister Jaguars that raid the city,
And when I open my eyes, my veins are pumped with a drum of adrenaline
I arise with a start, and am ready to jump up from my seat of silence
And call on the healing rain for our land.

My arms are weak and wobbly,
But the Hero in me claims she can fight.
My belly churns for food,
But the Hero in me says she can fast a millennium for the country.
I am shy and too scared to look my cranky father in the eyes
But the Hero in me says she is a brave damsel
who can face the world
She screams in my head all the time:

“You are unstoppable! You are the daughter of Ogedegbe Arogungboro,
You cannot be tamed.
You are a lion, and every time you roar, the whole city shakes!”

With this, I am charged, and my foot is placed on the accelerator.
I have seen in myself,
that I truly have what it takes to bring my home to El Dorado
I will play the music of the Wind
And make her bring back Peace
I will fuse the hearts of the people with the words of my mouth
So that they begin to realize that we can only prosper when we are all standing
and no one is on the floor.
And that life is not lived when you have someone to oppress
And that you do not get fulfillment from placing others at the height of your feet.

Look, I will match my country to the fountain of water behind Olumo rock
So that they can drink of the water of life
And never thirst again.
I will show them the power surge we build when our hands are tied together.
I will bring my people to the land of Wura
Where the flowers dance in the morning, and the birds sing as an orchestra
So that they are filled with laughter
Till they conclude that where they are
Is Paradise.

This I can do.
Do not be offended by my magnanimous statements,
It’s not my voice
It’s the voice of the Hero in me.
But she’s not just a voice,
She’s a person who will come to the surface
Sooner than you expect.