IS THERE A CITY IN THE SECOND PHASE

Her songs painted my heart with oceanic concerns & empathy unsolicited
My fellow passerby asked:
“what had given this woman such an angelic voice?”
That voice that letup the choruses of the church choir during the funeral ministrations
And assuaged the drum-beat of the forlorn-faced men
There was floods of tears across her face
But not a mourning tears me-think
She sang sweetly, she sighed sadly & she sang glorious songs & there was flow of clean tears streaming down like anointing oil

The woman might just be in her prime

She mumbled silently: “how can I fight
these battles in this wilderness alone?”
And other wailers joined her to mourn
But was the woman really mourning?

Her son, maybe two or three of age
Jumped down from a mourner’s lap and
hopped to his mourning mother & said with a beckon, “mum, stop crying, the preacher said, daddy had gone to a better home”.   

The woman smiled and said:
“son, is there a city in the second phase?”

                           

 
Abah, Linus Ajene was born in Ogo Oluwa L.G.A. of Oyo State and brought up in Idiri Okpoga in Okpokwu L.G.A. of Benue State where he has his biological root. He is a 400L student of Benue State University studying English/Education with the ambition of become an African Literature scholar as he progresses in life with time. He was the first runner-up of the 2017 Albert Jungers Poetry Prize and was also shortlisted for the 2018 Tony Tokunbo Fernandez International Poetry Competition. He is the current President of Writers’ League, Benue State University chapter. He writes poems and prose-fictions.