OUR BURDEN, OUR HOPE

It seemingly seem logical that when there's too much water in the system of a living organism, it tends to emit fluids often (sometimes to maintain a balance). Pardon, this is not me trying to bring you one of those biological teachings whose reputation for boredom never cease to awe those of us who have chosen to toe the path of pure arts. It is often said that water is the source of life and this assertion, I bet, has always made air jealous; how can water be the sustenance of life when without air man, animals, plants to mention but a few out of God's wonderfully knitted web of creation, cannot do without air? Without air, in my experience of life's dynamics, nothing that is would be. Am not trying to argue the well known reality that water holds life but, hey! Without air you won't be holding whatever medium you are currently reading my thoughts from and contemplating whether or not am sane. Yeah! "Why is jeyKAD confusing himself?" Forgive me, for I pitch tent with that which the stormy currents of my wavy thoughts lead me. Who it is that can withstand the direction of his/her mind I'm yet to see or read or hear of_ so don't blame this homosapien from whose mystery, thoughts are transformed to inks on pages.

Now let's digress awhile. Have you ever been in a pool or stream? Perhaps you've out of youthful zest been led by fragile yet adventurous hands of your childhood to a meandering tributary in your village. Hmm! Those fluttering of wings around river banks when you and your cohorts invade the public privacy of kingfishers and flamingos. The chorused rustling of aged leaves as your feet trample on the carpet they seem to form on beds of trees. That creaking sound that does not only come from amphibians but also from exo-skeletal organisms; crabs. Oh! That beauty of dimpled cheeks and awe filled glistening eyes at the sight of tiny fishes in shallow waters. Yes, you could not have missed out in all these unless you bulbed out of mummy's onion in a place where the consistency of the murmuring roar of traffic and chorused pleasantries and transactions are only altered when the cold fingers of night hush noise's mouth only for a while before the warmth of Sun in its impatience takes rule of the day. Oh city children! They miss out of sucking nature's raw but nutritious nostalgia.

However, am sure you've been into a containment of water, whether pool or river and after you must have killed the fear and allowed it's pleasure embrace you, something pushes you to venture further and the rest happen so fast. Those of us who are strong enough to carry ourselves out of the clinging arms of drowning depths vow never to go back nor even bath in water again. Some are almost strangled by hydro-phobia for the rest of their lives. 

Away from streams and pools, we drink water and accidents happen not only when we dare ourselves while swimming. Have you ever been so thirsty that when you paid some bucks to get a cold can of table water, it felt like you've played the most self destructive prank ever? That choking grip you feel down from your oesophagus to lungs, sending trickles of pains on your diaphragm. Where does it come from? A misnomer it is_ an accident borne out of the need to quench embers of thirst.

This is water. I see it, I drink from it, I bathe in it. It feels good on my skin (if it's not unwholesomely cold or hotter than I can take), it feels good in my bowels for it aids metabolic activities and ofcourse tissue respiration. Water is manifest but what about her sister in similitude? A concept whose abstraction yields to no proper definition, yet, I dare say it is that which weakens us in strength and strengthens us when weak. Just like water refreshes us after thirst, Love it is that makes us come alive. Water the source of life in the manifestation of procreation serves as the medium that nurtures life in its most minute phase; the sperm and ovum yet seem to choke same life off our lungs. Though I may have been misconstrued to think air any better, she can be greedy when we need her most. Thus, we gasp and hold unto anything with the strength of surging magma at the peak of an eruption like a drowning man does when neither air nor water (his most trusted) lends help.

This is the reality of life in its complexity and complication. Though there is a danger in trusting and thrusting into love, the greater risk lies in not yielding to this plague of men's hearts. Though the result of loving or depending on same may be the end of us, we still seek to fall on her rosy beds. Leaving our all and hearts in the care of another who we trust like water and hoping not to be choked when we dare seek its pleasure to kill thirst or for leisure.

It is our burden as it is hope for those who have faith.

__ Prince Jeremiah Kadiri