The Needless Flight Poem by Henry Isiekwe

We wake every morning
rushing out wildly like
penguins to shore
And plunging excitedly
Into the uncertain
waters of life

We rush wildly to sea
And give life our best strokes
Swimming and diving madly
Across the boundless sea
Not quite sure what it is
we're searching for
But swimming nonetheless
swimming in the hope that
we might find something
we never lost

We run out of ourself
every morning
and run into the sun
Running fast and running hard
And never slowing down
Not quite sure why we run
But running hard nonetheless
running because everyone
else is running

Those of us who live in Lagos
Never tire of running
we run to outrun the world
In Lagos we run to outrun
life itself

And while we pressed forward
and strived to beat the world
While we inched breathlessly
towards the big picture
We discovered to our dismay
that we have lost our way
home

We have lost ourself and
no longer know who we are
Out of steam and out of breath
and no longer seeing sense
in our flight
we faint and despair

But we must not despair
or lose faith now
we must set out to sea at once
we must embark on a voyage
of self discovery and find
our true self again
we must venture into the sun
and begin to run once again
in the hope that we may discover
who we are

in our hustle
in our greed
and in our delusions
We misunderstand life
and mistake it for needless strife
We forget that life is a cup of hot tea
That should be savoured and relished
sip by sip in cold weather