Memories,
Like the cold ashes of harmattan
Slumber upon the mind’s terrace
In our silences they visit
Not as the ghosts of our ancient domains
In whose company we are but hostages
But as the guests of our ceremonial thought
Whose flamboyant arrival throws up for ridicule
our lavish hospitality
Yesterday is certainty, served in a splinter of marble
Today is up in the clouds, and like a bloated star
Only festers the fallen embers of memories
Tomorrow is an illusion, conjured up on the horizon of desires
To soothe the pangs of nightmarish past
But when the wheel that steers us on course ruptures
We gather our dejected selves along the beaten track
We are prisoners of memories; their besieged empires.
Sosthenes N. Ekeh is a lecturer in the Department of English and Literary Studies, UNN. He has lectured at Godfrey Okoye University, and Bigard Memorial Seminary, both in Enugu. He is a literary critic and a creative writer, with poems, short stories, playlets and research papers published in both local and international journals. He was the Editor of The Muse no. 43, and the Associate Editor of poetry in The Muse no. 42.