Echidime!

Tomorrow!

You hold my future in your hands

I therefore stand in awe of you

I stand in awe of you

Not because you can defeat me

But because you are uncertain

Uncertainty comes before a defeat

And it would be a sheer madness to fight with an enemy

You cannot not see or know where he comes from

Or what he comes with

I cannot make a prediction of you

I cannot sneak a look into you

I cannot say what you look like

I can never fathom you

Or defeat you

For fighting against you

Is not like fighting against flesh and blood

But fighting against principalities and power

You are highly elusive!

What manner of creature are you?

What colour are you made of?

Who is so heartless and loveless to cause your being?

What manner of joy does our worry about you give to you?

You are heartless and mean!

Pregnant and unfathomable!

Highly unpredictable and Incomprehensible!

And always come with heartache and headache

Arrogantly showing up with might and main as a knight

And flamboyantly terrorising us with anxiety and angst.

*Echidime is an Igbo Language word that translates into ‘Tomorrow is Pregnant’ in English.

Chukwunwikezarramu Okumephuna

June 11, 2007.