Throes of Survival.

 

#DailyPost
Destitutes they were, those gems uncovered
The ores unrefined, so was their look
The ghettos their homes; dark and dingy
Assumed to be of trivial value
Treated like they were the opposites of homo sapiens
Their lives of constant struggles, not a sham

Dawn breaks, they’re out of their dwellings
To school, no; the streets, aye!
Hawking goods through the day
Right in the middle of Lagos roads
Charging after cars in the moving traffic
For the meagre amount they hope to realize
A thousand beads of sweat adorning their faces
Their clobber drenched in their own perspiration

Racing themselves in the midst of moving wheels
And roaring playful malisons against themselves
They’ve made the job their funfair
Laughing at their own clumsiness
They soon forget their sore shapes
After the days’ deals, they cluster and chatter
A bevy of young bright individuals

Filthy and sweaty; to their shelters they return
Their ensemble bedecked with sweat stains
Farmished and spent; their belliies they settle
Then they fade into oblivion – to Camelot
Their abodes of tranquil and abundance
Signs of their long, hard struggles no longer evident

Exposed to the harshest of realities
A ray of hope in their foggy days
They live their lives, smiles adorning their worn faces
Daily earnings – their turning points
And they seem to share more than the rich
Mankind is so obtuse
For they treat these jewels with open disdain

A lot of car-owning, ego-pumping individuals look down on people who sell their wares between traffic, by the roadside.  This, amigos, does not apply to the rich alone but to every common individual; middle-class or poor. In a lot of ways, these people (the hawkers- for lack of a better word) are so much better than those who sit in the comfort of their homes  and extort people or those who openly snatch people’s properties or………fill in every other vice you know. These ones  spend what is called “clean cash“, the generous rewards of their actual struggle. This portion of their lives, I believe, is polishing them for greater, better things (this much I know). It is saddening that some young, agile, completely healthy  individuals have adopted the “beggars’ style“. Did anyone ever say greatness comes cheap? Our lives could be likened to an ore, quite raw at first. Before the gold is extracted, it has to go through some massive heat. We all would encounter our tests, like it or not. Making life easy for someone struggling to survive brews a kind of sweetness and satisfaction
within ones’ soul, at least I think so. If you are in the “rich kid” crew, make the most of it (in a good way), it’s a privilege some others can’t afford.
PS: In the midst of a traffic at Ikeja, I met a man who had his lower extremities paralyzed legs. His job – assisting traffic officials.
…….for the laborer is worthy of his hire!