Ogbanje : Reincarnation

... My friends who had gone always came back with deformed bodies and sad tales. My closest friend, Bisi, told me that she died because there was no electricity in one hospital she found herself in. She died from heat. Another friend of mine, Emem, died in one horrible place located in Akwa-ibom. The community and her mummy and daddy killed her. They called her a witch. They said she was the cause of their poverty. I asked her if she was the cause and she looked at me and wept. Her face was filled with scars and her back showed signs of machete cuts. I held her and told her that everything will be fine but she shed more tears. Crying became her hobby. Nowadays, everyone called her crying beauty. I cannot forget Adamu too. We called him the golden child. After he visited that country, he came back mad. He was born in a state called Zamfara. He inhaled golden dust and died. It was said that his father and mother worked for an American company dealing in gold production. As the parents worked on the gold mine, Adamu inhaled the dust. When asked about his experience, he laughed. Nothing came out from his mouth. But Adamu’s tale floated around like a heavy balloon. All these made me cringe

I complained to our king. He laughed and said: “ you are already behaving like the people. Complaining and not doing anything about the problem. Hiding instead of facing the challenge. For this behaviour, I will send you to that land to teach you some lessons.” After the king’s declaration, I vowed to come back.

So, I was sent into this young woman’s womb on a sunny Sunday afternoon in one house at Victoria Island. I grew, listened, learned and unlearned. It was while I was reading that I came across this statistics about births in this country. My eyes caught this fact from a magazine my mummy was reading: “Every single day, Nigeria loses about 2,300 under-five year olds and 145 women of childbearing age. This makes the country the second largest contributor to the under–five and maternal mortality rate in the world.” From then, I knew that death was mine. I remembered that my mummy prayed for my case to be different. However, I saw my end.
I reported this case to my king. He replied: “to live is to suffer.” I wanted to correct his statement but I was scared. This was what I wanted to say, “ to be born in Nigeria is to suffer and to live in Nigeria was to die in the suffer.”

Written by Michael Irene,
Anglia Ruskin University,
Cambridge.

Series: Ogbanje
Title: Reincarnation
Medium: Charcoal on smooth pelican paper
Art: Hyperrealism