Searching For Thieves. Poem by Tony Adah

Searching the land for those
Who stole our yams and cassava
Stole rice and stole proceeds
From our golden crude that shakes
And spin dollars like a mint.

Probes, the order of the regime
Brimming the land
Hanging lopsided like injustice
In an Abuja high Court
The prober wearing a hood
Of immunity hiding beside the rock.

Probe the land
Probe the water
Probe the air
And see that none belong
To the citizens
Probes that never reach the heels
Of the prober trotting the globe.

Probes, half-hearted duty
Garbing a cloak of invisibility
On the thieves,
Probes, that give verve to the
Sneeze of a moody sheriff
And the opposition party
Having an inoculum of a flu.

Probes of naming a dog and the owner
Landing in a net of the hungry
And overzealous police,
Probe the entrails and look for
What is stolen that makes citizens
Join famished as they are.
Waiting for the unending probes
That emasculate the common people
And make a few pudgy like
The Queen termites with soldiers
On guard
Time we prostrate in your domain
Waiting for you to finish the probes
Or the probes will finish us.