IMAGE SOURCE; Ohanaeze Ndi Igbo Isiguzoro
CHAPTER ONE
I use to have the most vivid memories of my childhood, they usually come in sudden flashes like a dazzling light when something synonymous to that same memory come rushing into my mind and in just a twinkle of an eyes, disappears like it wasn't even part of my past in the first place. My friends use to wonder how come I remember things that happened to me as a three year old, while they find it difficult to even remember any memory of themselves even as eight year olds.
I didn't have the nicest of childhoods, because the memories i usually recollect were of me consoling my crying mother as she wept bitterly, on other occasion I remembered myself as a four year old being snubbed by a group of playing children who felt I was too fragile or possessing a complicated past which made me unqualified to play the game they were playing. This negativity and enigma that surrounded me was like a blot to my innocence as a child coupled with people always calling my grandfather a diabolic and a wicked man made me wish I could be Vasco da Gama or whoever invented the telescope to take a peek, a flashback into my past
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(FLASH FORWARD TO THE PRESENT DAY)
My grandfather has been dead for a decade and my father has been dead for 5 years but yet people speak more of my grandfather more than they do of my father, they seem terrified of him and was even more glad that he's dead and rotting away. I remembered riding in an old Raleigh bicycle with him as he strapped me to the back seat as a four year old i was smiling as he tickled my cheek from where he was sitting peddling his bicycle but then the memories fizzled away like that was were it ended i tried going back to when I was two years, but it was like i always hit a brick wall even my special memories had limits it was all blank, just darkness and nothing at all. "Chukwu (God) if I'm going to hate my grandfather and abhor or renounce him i need a reason to" i moaned in silent whimpers clasping my hands in prayers on my bed watching as the kerosene lantern faded away to reveal the night's true image of pure darkness
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The day I came back from Lagos, I decided to see round the dilapidated village the shrines and scanty places of worship it was obviously people were abandoning the village and seeking greener pastures in places like Niger Delta and riverine places like Asaba that has crude oil that could be sold to the white men for a few pounds sterling.
I jolted back to my present status as i was walking a bush path through the village streets of Umudulu after strolling down a few sharp turns i came upon the village mad man sitting and genuflecting to himself obviously in a crazed reality he's existing in, he made to pursue me but i ran till I got to the main road and that was where my woes started
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"Ewo look at him I pity him so much, what a fine man he is and he even look so much like his nasty grandfather" They whispered in turn as i slowed down my pace to listen to their gossips, i was perplexed, totally furious and finally downtrodden it was like he was etched in the bad side of history, but then what side of history was my father etched on? Why was he less popular? Why are there so many rumor and not a solid truth about the past from anybody? Nobody who lived in the days of my grandfathers was willing to say something about him, and yet they were like an encyclopedia of his life history.
On a particular day I was walking down a bush path and I met a bearded man, he should be probably in his late 80s and he looked at me and blurted "nwam" (my child) you look so much like "Ichie okorie" (my grandfather's name) "I heard you're in the big city of Lagos, I'm glad you came visiting" he feigned a smile, I saw my opening and asked him very quietly but firmly "Ehrmm Nnayi please tell me a little about my.........." he jolted and snapped before I could finish and then replied "An adage says that when a great elephants falls the ant are still scared of his lifeless carcass" he added quite silently this time "Let the past bury the past" with this he turned quickly and glided past the blades of grass in the bush paths and disappeared into the hills.
I was left stunned and bamboozled ekwensu (the devil) must be shamed i mused, What could be so gory about my past that was so difficult to unearth I asked rhetorically? As I stood drowning in my thoughts. I felt bedevilled by a sudden darkeness. My liver seems to be failing me, beads of perspiration forming on my armpit trickling down my arm
THANK YOU FOR READING MY FACTION STORY, SET ORIGINALLY IN SOUTH EASTERN NIGERIA
(Words in italics originally from Igbo language of the South eastern Nigeria)
Written illustrated & told
By @Josediccus
5/10/2018
(This story is almost like an autobiography of a real life experience
forgive the Gina 😀😀)
Visit my blog for more amazing poems contents and stories.
JOSEPH C.IKECHUKWU