The Roof over my head: a musing on Biafran struggle -By J. Ezike

My pen hurries to write on this blank paper. For my spirit has fully conceived the Roof over my head. But before I forget and before any of us forgets, let me surrender this Truth onto the hands of History. Indeed, when the rain beats the Roof, it is the ears that suffer the noise. In telling the words of my spirit, my pen bleeds and my paper drowns in ink. But only the spirit carries the purity of Truth. Delusions, indeed, may indicate shadows, but the shadow is evidence of a Being rooted against light. And what is Light, my child? Light is Truth.

When Great Darkness fell upon my world and my stars banished into self-exile, I held the sun of Biafra against my face like an Olympic Torch and took a great marathon across the seven seas and the seven mountains into the whitelands that became the conception of my future history. None but the silent Sun will stand as witness to this epistle touched on the crown of truth. None but the silent Sun knows the daily struggles of my youthful feet that found solace in the Roof over my head.

At last, I find home away from Home. And there, I wrestle another war away from the War that lives and fights back from miles away. A war so new and so curious. A war as white as snow and its songs in harmony with the War that beckons my spirit from miles away, from the crumbling Nigger-Area. I find the Roof over my head where my pen hurries to write on white paper, in the tick tock of North American midnight and my words conjured by the Spirit turns into spell. And the spell revealing 7 characters and out of the Great Darkness, they appear in legions and take sides with Goliath. And like the Rainbow, I see the divinity of 7 in this new war – a war I did not beckon, a war unleashed upon me. Indeed, I see the handwriting of the Divine in it, and so I take the difficult fate with enormous good grace. For truly, the 7 characters are born that I may fulfill destiny.

I met them all: The Depressed, The Mentally-ill, The Ghosts, The Zombies, The Masks, The Trappers and The Puppets. And in my quest to wield the Light of Freedom and let it shine, my Truth became Taboo and my speech and words on paper likened to the utterances of a Mad man, a Spy and a One-man terrorist group. And so they say: “He is suffering from the delusion of being watched and followed and the delusion of being free and original like the Sun, like the Moon and the like Stars.” To discredit my Light and the Truth in my divine language and the Spirit Words that poured out of the soul of my pen, the Roof made room for the scourge of nature. So when the rain came, it let it fall on my head. When the sun came, it urged it to burn me into ashes that my mind may turn grey and tired, dragging the sweats of hell out of my youthful face. Starving my flesh so that my skin may betray my bones and assume the weight of a conscious broom stick, a walking dead man, a tattered beggar. The Roof, hardened by my Biafran ideology, swore to make itself my casket, to take the shape of my early grave. And so it encouraged my death, anticipated my suicide and forgot that I had come to Her for solace. Silently, stealthily and strategically, the Roof tortured me without the World’s notice and left me to rot in stupor. And slowly, I shrunk and shrunk and shrunk in the combined force of Her brutality. But before Her eyes, I refused to be broken. I refused to give up my ideal. And through my actions and inactions, I made it clear to Her and Her Mother that it is Biafra or Death!

To achieve the satisfaction of desperate victory and declare itself innocent, the Roof over my head tagged me – Mad and Dangerous and swore to use this propaganda in defense of its villainy, as an alibi to this war – a war I did not beckon, a war unleashed upon me. And my offense is that I held the Sun of Biafra against my face like an Olympic Torch and called the cloned-impostor of Asorock by its name.

With only my pen, my paper and the Spirit of God, I captured the attention of the World and its leaders to register the plights of my persecuted people. Though my flesh suffered, my spirit remained resolute. Truly, my child, the struggle for freedom is not a tea-party but a war tailored only for the mentally strong and the spiritually faithful. For over 12 months my resolve was thrown in the fire. And so I began to age like the Iroko Tree planted in a jungle and my young face scarred with the beards of a great struggle, a great injustice as old as 1945.

But a warrior is proved such by the wounds of the heart and he must continue even though he carries the burden of a nation. His pen must never run dry. His voice must never find silence. And when he sings the song of freedom, he must never be ashamed of his failures, of his mistakes, for they are all parts of the script to the Promise Land.

Courage is not the abstraction of fear. It is the firm commitment to do the will of the Human Spirit. So you see, my child, I carry this burden for a reason. Though they strike me from 360 degree angle, I bear it for the sake of freedom, my freedom – Your Freedom.

In this Roof over my head, in this beautiful slaughterhouse, my flesh became the target of their swords. And so the 7 characters took turns to break me and find the very strong inner-fortress of my spirit. But, I invite you, my child, to witness and judge between me and the 7 characters, who deserves to be called –Mad, a Spy and a Terrorist. For the sake of the two watchful eyes of History I pour these words. For like a Mother, I bring you the breasts of Truth and Reality so that you may suck from it and grow in awareness of my struggle.

I shall begin with the 7 characters:

The Depressed patronizes my hell with perfunctory smiles. So smooth are their words like fine wine tempered with the taste of grape. In their scripts, I am the Mad Man – the one whose brain has rebelled against sanity.

The Mentally-ill from his throne wishes to have me under his control, to be subdued, ridiculed and labeled exactly what he is: a psychopath. In his white suit and red tie, he appears sane and guiltless at first sight, but his mind is a perfect portrait of a round peg in a square hole.

The Ghosts derive pleasure in manifesting as strange text messages and unwanted phone calls. Choosing not to be known or seen, but prefers to exist in the background, to be heard and read in stealth.

The Zombies are the actors and actresses on the streets, on the buses and everywhere. They walk to the conscious rhythm of my footsteps. In their tens, in their hundreds they follow –from dusk till dawn.

The Masks are my “buddies, friends, confidants and official helpers”. They provide necessities: shelter, food, money, advice… but, behind my back, work to the scripts of the Mentally-ill in whose command their dubious acts are made Just and Patriotic.

The Trappers are the objects of seduction with compelling female bodies tinged with the sweet poison of Delilah. In their haunting eyes, I am Samson – the strongman that must fall by all means. Though I admit that my carnality lies in the body and beauty of a woman, but not one day did I fall to the traps, not one night did I grant audience to their flirtations armed in stealth.

The Puppets O the Puppets are the ones I truly care about. For these are the good people, the ordinary people and the masses, led into ignorance and their innocence exploited by the Mentally-ill. And so they offer conversations, jobs, opportunities and their time in exchange for an “information of value.” They share one thing in common with the rest of the characters and that is: they pretend not to know who I am.

And so my silence, my thoughts, my words and my spirit proves the reason of their sinister attacks. But let me remind them that I am a child of God. And I was born for a reason: to restore Biafra. And those who fight me, fights Biafra. And those who fight Biafra, fights God.

Now, in all honesty, my child, between me and all the 7 characters – who is Mad? Who is a Spy? Who is a Terrorist? Who wears the colors of mental disorder? Who suffers from the delusion of being watched and attacked in stealth? Indeed, in the eyes of the World, the Roof is a saint. But I tell you, as a tenant, this Roof is a Hypocrite.