Things Fall Apart.

" Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things Fall Apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world" W. B. Yeats

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"MAKE WE SCATTER THIS PLACE TONIGHT. DANCE AND SWEAT LIKE SAY NA FIGHT; WE MUST TO SETTLE THIS THING TONIGHT..." a seven year old Cynthia sang and danced to Tiwa Savage's ALL OVER as it oozed sweetly from the Barber's shop opposite her house before her mother burst out from the house.

"Cynthia! If you don't do and bathe and enter this house now I'll be all over you like Aboki perfume!" she scolded from the passage.
"What thing do you know that you want to settle? Nonsense" she said and turned back in.

Cynthia immediately began to scrub her back and legs and belly, covered with lather and poured water at the same time. She knew what would become of her should her mother decide to settle the matter with her.
Nonetheless, that didn't stop the seven year old from dreaming: "One day I will be on television and sing and dance like Aunti Tiwa" she always said to her friends in school and at the market.

Cynthia was an excellent pantomime that graciously entertains everyone around her. All she needed was a smartphone playing Tiwa Savage's songs and the rest will be history. This caused people to call her Tiwa Savage; she was in love.

Puppy love don't last. This isn't a fact; it's a prophesy. Albeit it's still a kind of love and Cynthia played it with her eight year old lover Uche; the most brilliant student in Logo Community Primary School.
Uche wanted to become a doctor and he loved Cynthia, puppy love.

The night was still and quiet as the moon wearily stood watch over the agrarian community that one would have thought the scorching sun had molested her all day before retiring to bed some few hours ago.
There was unrest in most communities, hence, unlike the sun, the people of Tombo couldn't go to bed peaceably with their eyes closed.

That night Cynthia dreamed of Lagos; Lagos was heaven. The roads were made of fine gold with gigantic bridges and electronic stairs hovering across them; houses built with glass; water was crystal clear like the springs of Iskaba. God resided in Lagos and so did Tiwa Savage; they played, they laughed, they merry-go-rounded. This was the life; the good life.

"Pow! Pow! Pow!" sporadic shots were fired from close by; guns called and fire responded. Red earth houses were razed down, their leaf-made roofs torched up. Loud noises and whistles were heard from different corners. The armed nomads were at it again; they flouted the rule of law unceremoniously, regarding themselves as the law.

These herdsmen with automatic rifles, swords, bows and arrows hacked down the people of Tombo like harvested yam tubers.
Cynthia stomped out of the house bare footed. The Barber's shop was already on fire. Her father and mother were no where to be found. Villagers skittered to safety only to meet their doom in haven.

"Papa! Mama!" she screamed with tears running down her cheeks unchecked.

"Allahu Akbar!" "Allahu Akbar!"
"I am the messenger of Allah cleansing the earth!" Two trigger happy herdsmen yelled in Fulani, appearing from nowhere and shooting randomly as though it were a sport.

Cynthia hearing the shots and screams turned just in time to be kissed on the skull by a machete. She writhed in the pool of her own blood.
" Allahu Akbar!" they sang and torched up the  house behind them.

Cynthia gasped; she took heavy short breaths and was awakened to a sudden reality --the air she breathed was limited.
She had been taught in school that air was in abundance; but that was not the case. On this night, everything was short and burned out fast; the air; Papa; Mama; Tiwa Savage; Uche --her dearest Uche.
It was not going to last anyway; puppy love, it never lasts.

~Angel Messi~