By YJ Itopa.
We have beautifully bided Lucy Damian
Farewell as she went to meet her maker
While the families of the deceased were weeping
That the shelter into which people easily
Could run in the rain had been gutted by fire
Weeping that the stream to which people could run
For fount had been slurped up by tongue of drought
While her colleague Journalists and Labour leaders
Were weeping that a friend and Comrade
In the service of mankind had suddenly
Skiddooed like a nimble moon vamoosing
Behind a saddened sky on a pitch dark night
And moaning that a maestro mentor
Had crossed the sea
Not looking back at crying beautiful babies
While her husband sorrowed in blood and swore
Lucy in death would remain his wonderful wife
Wooing woe to waylay him if he ever wooed
Another woman for a wife after Lucy had
Turned his hitherto little known name, Damian
Into cotton and into thred, weaving it
Into cloth on the long loom and made it
Into a wide umbrella Damian and spreading
The name across the limelight sky
Spreading it in roots and tentacles like the seed
In succulent soil as he wrote and voiced her story
Ceiling it with her seal:
” Lucy Damian, reporting “
Making Damian as a name to be sweet
Like sugared berry on many tongues
And appeasing aplenty to the heart of households
” Lucy Damian reporting “
The poet was not crying the way others
Were crying but was musing with his muse
And his mindful muse asked him
To ask the people of this earth that since they said
Lucy was as calm as cucumber
Lucy was as helpful as a good Samaritan
Lucy was as gentle as a dove on the dome
Lucy lived a life of self abnegation
Lucy lived and died for others to live
Why did Lucy not live long like a sagely Methuselah
Teaching them
Love and kindness
The difference between humility and submissiveness
Easygoing and the art of brainy rigour
Journalism of knowledge, integrity and courage
Journalism that crowns them as the conscience
Of the society
Teaching them
How to be good children and good siblings
How to be good daughter and sister-in laws
How to be good wives and good mothers
How masters can be saints in the hearts of subordinates
How to practise what we preach at the altar as hypocrites
How to woo the moon for lamp when the night is dark
Why was Lucy not allowed to live long
And lived long like sagely Methuselah
Why are the pious people the ones I see going home
And always in the morning , reporting early to heaven?
