Orisons At Dawn Poem by Nkwachukwu Ogbuagu

A faint smile paints the face of a pilgrim.
Sadness remains glued to the palate
As long as the hurried meal tastes awful.
When the moon becomes stingy with its light
The rich and the poor grope.
Darkness confirms the weakness of light, when it fails
To shine through the veil of the night, bloated and
Coarse, formless and cruel.
We light our lamps to the effulgence of
Our hearts, dampened by the harsh courage of
Edgy darkness.
Emptiness rummages through the tunnels within us
Prayers are often said in preemptive recitals,
Behind the second crow of impatient cocks,
Trying to rouse an inebriated homestead.
Our faiths take French leave through
Mangled doors of rusty hinges.
How do we summon protocols of atonement
When we still query the harshness of the sun?
Through which doors can our faiths return
Even now we resummon them?
Do we still hang on to our pledges to our souls,
That we shall blame no more, the slowness of
Tortoise on his huge carapace?
We regret the rape of the stones
Which help to salivate our streams
When the rains of May spit from heaven.
Let us trek through the heart of the village
At dew time, when the eyes still reflect
The dreams of the previous night.
Hurry, kinsmen, before the sun returns from
The other worlds. My heart trembles at the
Restlessness of dews when marched on by hurrying
Sinners. Ignore the hootings, kinsmen, from
Concupiscent owls, for theirs is the kingdom of
Darkness lightened by decaying dew.
Let us not provoke the idleness of procrastination,
For it is a Thursday, a day of transparent boredom.
Come to the heart of the village, to the core of our
Lives. Hurry, foot-legged men and women.
Prepare alleviating hymns. Improvise salvaging
Songs whose cadence would dry the dews and burn
Out the flames from our lamps.
Chant songs of confessions, canticles of self-abnegations
Lower your voices on the edge of the morn so as not
To wake sleeping shores beyond.
We must lament this waste, this incongruous harmony.
We must sing to death, this monster within us
That ruins our harvests.
Write, kinsmen, write to our pilgrim kinsmen
To pray for the recovery of our soul,
Our nutrition of life,
Our sanity.
Ask, everyone, for our restoration, like the house of Jacob.
Ask for our commitment toward enhancing the speed of
Laughter to our ribs.
Kinsmen, pray. Lament the tar on our streams that make
Us drink spells of misery. Mourn the disasters our daughters
Face from creased pregnancies. Cry wolf now you see a wolf
Piercing the doom of this early morning’s dews.