The fact that the gender that bears and brings forth humanity
Is often treated with unveiled disdain and repugnant brutality
Truly, is an irreconcilable absurdity of the human existence.
Save our girls!
YemilBenjoy ©
The fact that the gender that bears and brings forth humanity
Is often treated with unveiled disdain and repugnant brutality
Truly, is an irreconcilable absurdity of the human existence.
Save our girls!
YemilBenjoy ©
Filed under Life
So today, while I was driving at dusk thinking about the day ahead and trying to talk to my maker, the master and creator of the universe. Suddenly, apparently out of nowhere, something darted across the road before me and that cast the dye for this written soliloquy. How wrong we are sometimes about what we believe we see. Although, we believe we know and sometimes are certain of what we think we see, in reality, probably we are not. How often erroneous assumptions pervade our consciousness and take root therein almost obliterating objectivity. Although, we hold steadfast onto particular conceptions, nonetheless it is not always a case of – it always is – therefore it is… In retrospect, how wrong I probably was, when I marveled then in unwavering certainty and jocular manner about the grasshopper that skipped across the road before the wheels of my car. I considered how extremely lucky it was, to make it across the street just in the nick of time, thankfully. I drove onward and wondered where it was coming from, where it was going. Its apparent and fleeting skipping reminded me with fond nostalgia of a song I used to sing when I was in primary school – Grasshoppers, three a fiddling went… Singing to myself, I continued on my merry way. A short distance later, up the hill, I came upon a carpet of fallen leaves and a little gust of wind in accord with the day’s elements lifted two and caused them to skip across the road before me, almost in unison. Yes, not unexpectedly, because of the elements … but now bewilderment engulfed me. Which was playing games on me, my eyes or my mind. After prior firm belief that it was a grasshopper I had seen earlier, uncertainty now pervaded my consciousness. Hence, after observing the two leaves rise and land almost in alternating equidistant spaces across the road similar to my unforgotten grasshopper, certainty was since replaced by ambivalence, to such extent that I doubted the veracity and confidence of what I thought I had most assuredly seen a few minutes ago. Concerning the leaves, they were clear and distinct because as they crossed, the dusk was lifting, and the beam of my headlamps illuminated their forms. Consequently, without human doubt I knew, or did I deduce, that they were leaves. Was I sure about what they were because I believed undoubtedly that they were leaves, undoubtedly because I had seen them or was this somewhat a resultant deduction because I seen a carpet of fallen leaves before the two leaves in motion. Of the leaves can I now be absolutely certain. And of the first encounter … was it a grasshopper or a leaf…
YemilBenjoy ©
Although this is a fictional narrative, sadly it is to convey what an abducted girl in captivity may write:
Mr. President,
I had to abruptly stop writing the other day because I heard one of the captors coming and if they had found me writing they would have beaten me mercilessly to the point of death like my best friend. I miss her, my sister and everyone I love. I try to remember their faces so that I never forget them. I can only write this letter because I had a notebook and pen with me when we were abducted. We take turn hiding the items so that they are not found.
This letter gives us a dim flicker of hope that you will send troops to rescue us from this quagmire. It seems that we will never be rescued. The captors laugh at us. They laugh at our nakedness, tell us we are worthless and will be sold as sex slaves. It is just so awful to hear and contemplate. They tell us that our government does not care about us and will not rescue us, and that even if the government tried, they will not be able to rescue us. Is this true? For if it is, that is nothing but damnation for us. For we are damned by the acts of the foreseeable abduction, that was not prevented, and the failure to rescue us, to a wretched existence of shame, torture, ridicule, bondage and repeated violation. If you will not or cannot rescue us, have you asked other countries that can rescue us to save us from this cursed forest.
Words cannot adequately describe the depth of my despair nor convey the feeling of helplessness at being violently uprooted from the foundation of my life. It is a state of complete desperation. I am deathly afraid. I have not seen my mother’s smile nor heard my father’s voice in weeks, let alone the streets of my community or the sunset over my home. Why? I know that my grandmother wears her black garment of lamentation to mourn for me. Yet I am not dead. Alas, the pathetic irony is that I may be alive, yet I am not living. How could this happen to me, all because I am girl who went to school in Chibok. I miss my life.
It is another forsaken day in captivity. It is raining again and there is minimal shelter. We sit huddled together and dare not express our real feelings or we will feel the cold ends of the guns against our heads. We wait silently for the sun to come out to dry our skin and our clothes. I no longer like the sound of rain. I tried to cry but no tears came. I tried to console another girl who does not speak any more but no words came forth, so I hold her hand and it is very cold. When will this suffering end? Will it ever end?
I wonder, is it right that some men because they have power over vulnerable school girls, can change the course of our lives, sending us to premature deaths and selling us into slavery. Why are we the scapegoats and sacrificial lambs at the altar of anarchy and depravity? They boast. They say that they are more powerful than ever. They plan more bombings and kidnappings.
I must stop again. Save us please.
Fictional story to be continued – Chibox and now Dapchi Girls
YemilBenjoy ©
Filed under Life
Tragically, as one month painfully bleeds into more without the return of the abducted school girls, a few candid thoughts on what not to do during a national crises include:
No crocodile tears and:
1. Do not ignore the news of the abduction assuming a posture of feigned ignorance (posterity is judging).
2. Do not fail to take immediate action after the abduction to rescue the girls.
3. Do not spread propaganda after the abduction suggesting that the girls had been rescued when they were still languishing in the clutches of captivity (aka – a blatant misrepresentation).
4. Do not show callous indifference by failing to act in for weeks after the abduction (compounding the atrocity).
5. Do not as President fail to go the city and State where the girls were abducted to speak directly to their traumatized and brokenhearted families and communities (no excuses suffice).
6. Do not refuse to immediately ask other nations for assistance with directing the rescue mission when thus far you have been unable to rescue the girls and thereby allowed precious time after the abduction to dissipate (simply unconscionable).
7. Do not as government officials say you are tired of answering the same question when asked about the fate of the abducted girls and the plan of the government to rescue the girls (beyond contemplation).
8. Do not assume that the world is not making a record of your response to the abduction and will not castigate it in the strongest terms as a dereliction of duty.
9. Do not make an international spectacle of the country by making ill-advised speeches and statements that end up on social media making a mockery of and thrusting the nation into a state of sustained ridicule.
10. Do not forget that the girls are Nigerians that relied on the government for their security, safety and welfare.
11. Do not forget that the continued plight of the innocent girls every day they are in captivity is a ghoulish nightmare (and a blight on the nation’s history).
12. And above all, do not forget that the abducted girls are equally as important as your children and grandchildren (ponder this but for a moment).
YemilBenjoy ©
Filed under Life
Please world, kindly do NOT forget…
That the girls abducted from their beds
In their school dormitories while they slept
At night in Nigeria, taken from their dreams and hopes
Cast into a jungle of despair
Have not yet been returned to their families.
Please do not forget them.
Thank you for caring.
YemilBenjoy ©
Filed under Life
When did the government know that the girls were kidnapped? Did the government know about the kidnapping 4 hours before the kidnapping occurred or after the girls had been kidnapped?
What was the action plan developed by the government to prevent the kidnapping if they were forewarned about the kidnapping?
What was the action plan developed by the government immediately after receiving news of the kidnapping? If an action plan was developed, when was it developed?
Why was there communication soon after the kidnapping conveying that the girls had been found?
When was the mission to rescue the girls activated by the government?
Did the government wait for the offer of assistance from other nations or immediately request assistance?
Did the gender of the kidnapped children play a role in the handling of the national calamity?
Are there men and women willing to resign in light of the handling of the national calamity?
Is the welfare of Nigerians important?
For the abducted girls, the inconsolable families and the distraught nation – somebody please answer these questions.
YemilBenjoy ©
Filed under Life
I am a girl.
I am a human being.
I am a citizen of the world.
I have a mother who weeps for me.
I have a father who searches for me.
I have a brother and sister who do not know where I am.
I have a family bewildered by my disappearance.
For someone stole my life from me.
Took me violently from everything I knew and loved
And from all those who loved me, and brutally
Forced me into a state of no existence
Because my gender is female, and like
An object with no spirit and no name
Cast me aside for the use of others
In complete disregard for my humanity
Without a care about my dreams and hopes
And against my will and without my consent.
Am I invisible…
Can nobody hear my crying in the night.
Is the world deaf to my screaming when I am raped.
Is the world oblivious to the bleeding from my wounds.
Is the world laughing when my body is exposed and
My essence is viciously taken from me repeatedly and by many
What did I do to deserve this.
Why does humanity allow this to happen.
Is nobody listening to my wailing.
Does nobody care.
Does anybody care.
Or do you choose not to care.
Will somebody please help me.
Please.
YemilBenjoy ©
Filed under Uncategorized
I am overwhelmed by your grace, oh Lord
For your mercy consumes my soul with joy.
You have constantly been attendant to my cries
And you have heard my silent weeping in the night.
Although, errant are my ways from your righteousness
Even yet, thy favour present and sudden embrace me.
Amid all the cares of this great universe under your charge
You in mercy incline thine ear unto my pleas, and in the
Abundance of thy healing power with blessings surround
My being, despite myself and despite my sins.
You with your faithfulness, cease not to part the
Red seas of my life, and with thy angels land me safely
On the promised side, according to your time and will, in awe,
My mortal frames acknowledges thy wondrous supremacy
And that through all life, thou are more than sufficient unto me.
Rejoice oh my soul, for the Lord of all creation, has in
Faithful covenant, manifest yet again, His love for me.
Blessed be the name of my God, the Almighty Jehovah
Ever present, mighty and ever victorious on the battlefield.
All praise, glory and thanksgiving be yours, my King
Forever and through the ageless age of eternity.
Yemil Benjoy ©
Filed under Uncategorized
Have you awoken your dreams lately, and beckoned
Intently to arouse them from their often slumber deep, to
Transform them from the somnolent stage to tenacious form
If not, the hour has but urgently dawned …
To have a forthright conversation with those dreams
Towards, claiming the full potential of their promise,
Stirring them beyond the dormancy of prolonged vagueness,
Henceforth, employing diligent measure, to invest in active industry
To crystallize the reality of resolute and tangible propulsion,
And earnestly, cause them to yield on your behalf, actual dividend.
YemilBenjoy ©
Filed under Uncategorized
Prologue:
Recently, I was fortunate to read “The Canonisation Of Terror” by Professor Wole Soyinka, Nobel Laureate. Subsequently, on Moji Delano’s blog, I read a response by Mr. Sadiq Abacha and the scathing commentary to the response by Mr. Ayo Sogunro.
And therefore …
Confuting The Temerity Of Infamy
Certain events, do necessitate the embracing of moral indignation
To unequivocally oppose and render in decisive refutation, rebuttal
In negation of attempts to present canards and contort historical accounts
Which now, ensuing from the inevitable confluence of the underlying
Antecedents, to the candid virtue of the phenomenal communiqué
Written by the literary colossus, commendably declining an award,
Cast irreverently in commensurable measure to the callously blatant
Odyssey of trepidation under the cruel and despotic reign of a general,
With the internationally acclaimed and distinguished Master of the pen,
Causing a son to piously whitewash deplorable and irrefutable facts.
Miserable is the agenda designed to obliterate from unforgotten memory
The utterly mordant and orchestrated degradation of human existence
Conjoined brazenly with the trampling of dignity to diminutive smithereens.
Where all description of travesty ran rampant in disjointed governance
And civil rights, lay mortified and shackled without succour’s promise, to the
Odious foot of vengeful oppression, when disdainful terror ruled supreme
With its cohorts of state mandated unspeakable hangings and assassinations,
Injected with the putrescent despoliation of the repugnant autocracy,
Causing the pride of resiliency to seek retreat within the mirage of valour
While hope’s essence quivered amid the stranglehold of the abysmal vile.
Should filial retort decide to duel in words with the legendary patriot,
An estimable author, who with inexorable invigorating zeal inspires
Scholarship through the preeminent lectern of intellectual tutelage,
Whose realm of the superlative in dexterous prose, elegantly instructs
And elevated the nation beyond its geographic confines and shores.
Thence, the indefensible portrayal of the tyrannical from the audacity
Of a dictator’s kin must be adeptly sculpted in conformity with precise
Grammatical cohesion without the illogicality of self-directed ironical
Drivel, riddled with the banality of obvious erratum and unveiled jargon
In contemptuous venture to reconstruct the chronicles of the despicable.
Alas, deviously spins the connivance of the web of the tepid pejorative,
In confabulation, distastefully adorned with the paucity of verbiage
Through vacuous equation, of the valiant pinnacle of literary erudition,
To the feigned commonality of peasantry, which pitifully illuminates,
The apparent nescience concerning the impact of laudable accomplishment
And failure to assimilate the magnitude of the stature of the Nobel Laureate,
Towards the immeasurable legacy of the enlightenment of discerning minds,
Is hideously evocative, of the ignominious tempest of the nefarious syndicate
Wherein the nurturing of advancement was bound shamelessly as hostage
In the dark and suffocating dungeons of the vandalism of absolute power.
Forsooth, woven narrative must never eradicate the plurality of atrocities
That dreadfully exacerbated the malicious persecution under the regime.
Repudiation must arise ramrod to beckon yet painful reminiscence,
Wretchedly and so forcefully etched indifferently into the societal memoirs
Whereby, liberty crouched vanquished under subjugation’s polished boots
And fear wantonly roamed unbridled, cloaked in garments of abuse, while
Incendiary devices, on land and in air, with other apparatus of the putrid
Perpetuated the malevolence of monstrous brutality interspersed deeply in
The quagmire, notorious for its horrendous propensity for retribution, that
Lacerated souls wept, and made incessant supplication for divine relief.
Indeed, a nation must vociferously disavow the recidivism of infamy
With bold solidarity, join in outright and unvarnished condemnation
Of the villainous repression that stood, mangled with abject hopelessness,
In concerted effort to eviscerate forever the demoralized core of optimism.
Lest, personification of the scourge in jest don prestigious camouflage
Within the habitation of honour and the aspiration of expectant progress
And parade unchallenged to the continued disillusionment of the weary.
Thus, the country’s annals must in proper measure, apportion to disrepute
The stigma of untainted reproach, to safeguard vigilance in ardently averting
For the ages, the unpalatable resurgence of the fury of unmitigated decadence.
Epilogue:
That all hope, not lie mortally incapacitated on the battlefield of conscience
Where in its stead, in the aftermath of the unconscionable, the reviled
Assume but again, the pedestal of depravity, as such, let us endeavour to recall
With vivid clarity, that which relentlessly haunts our national recollection,
And faithfully commit to notify the present and generations yet to come.
Dated this 9th day of March, 2014
Dr. ‘Yemisi Solanke Koya, Esq. ©
Golden Poet