A few drops of truth or honesty
To put bread on your table
Or a cover on your nakedness
Or a roof over your head –
Be it thatched or corrugated –
That you’d rather remain destitute?
Can you forbid saying sir to a cow
For the lust of flesh and pomo* –
Be it in form of Gucci or Versace,
Or a community of metals and plastic
(Better known as a car by humans) –
That you’d rather remain destitute?
For you see, my friend
Both poverty and property
Are stamped with an expiry date;
And virtues lost in the pursuit
Of the passing pleasures of loot
Are never, in this life, regained.
* * *
Pomo is a hide eaten as food in Nigeria.