WE NO LONGER REMEMBER

I can no longer remember

The faces of cousins of my childhood

Beautiful girls and boys whom together,

We dustied up the village-square in dry seasons

And in the rainy season shared the fireside

Eating roast corn and pear

Udochukwu left us pre-teen

   Louis, early teenage years

   Just a few got to semi-adulthood

Our innocence was murdered

At the threshold of teenage years

Dreams of a wonder-world slaughtered

By the gruesome hand of adulthood

Today we still aspire.

Building fresh dreams from the scattered bricks

Of shattered dreams

Dreams, which too soon shatter again

Providing fresh bricks for fresh

Temporary dreams.

I can no longer remember–and neither do you–

What it means to dream and believe in it

Reality is a gruesome night watchman with a sledge hammer

Hovering above us, and plundering

Dreams at their foetal stage.

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Poem © Nnaemeka Oruh

Image: Luke Price via Flickr