To be green is to be fertile,
a land whose river is milk,
a land whose ocean is honey.
Like a babe latches on her mother's breast, so do I latch my mouth on yours, for milk, for a plate of my daily bread, if not twelve baskets full.
Mother, your breast is engorged - dollars in boxers, pounds in undergrounds, euros in pillows, talents in transparent tents - do you not feel the pain?
6 months 5 weeks 2 days, a pale mother you were but you held your pink baby, firmly, smiled brightly, every time, through the weakness.
"Give me my baby." You demanded. "I can take care of her and I will." A song you sang night and day before officers in white could let you go.
"Exclusive breastfeeding! No water! No medications! Just breast milk, on demand!" an endless ocean for a mother they all juba.
Mother, the honeycomb drips honey - black oil runs beneath the soil like blood in your veins, big tubers of yam the Earth dare not hide - can you not see?
I could beat my chest that mother would not forget me, but I was wrong. In my mother's land, my dream is but murdered in bands.
"Can a mother forget the infant at her breast?" Mine did. But, a Father promised He would not, for my name (Nigeria) is inscribed in His palms.
#Isaiah 49:15-16
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