A huru m gi n’anya (I see you in my eyes)

Andrea Odinaka Orji

So, teach me of health. 

A variety of living swathed 

in safe comfort, though tenuous at best.

Lives molded around an avoidance of loss

For a thing that once lost seems fearful of return, and

Leaves us fearful of a dependence we may be forced to turn to.

For when lows reach the heights of analogous highs

The tumultuous history of humankind tells us

That memory ruminates on lows.

Still, a cycle of fear is naught

Without bliss.

So, show me joy

A spattering of moments…

Fleeting sights aligned with the highest;

Rendering us grateful to the air permitting us to breathe.

Praise be to mornings devoid of pain, harbinger of endless uncertainty.

Blood pumping to every bit of our being through passageways unharmed.

Health asks us for nothing more than consistency

Knowing fully well that we can never deliver it

In a world ruled by entropy, wherein 

life is ripped from life anew.

Still, death is only a 

matter of time.

So, speak to me of death.

And she recalled a time when she stood,

Room steeped in the must of late afternoon sunlight,

By a man antithetical to her being with

whom she had formed a bond.

His daughter cried,

Siblings raged in chords of indignation.

While his cells chose careless independence

In exchange for his precious life.

Still, in the eyes of those who saw him

There was another way.

She recalled a time when she stood.

In a spot where 48 hours prior,

There had only been joy.

And in the 24 to come

She would stand again

Over a table? A bed?

In a room riddled with cold fluorescence, 

Where the absence of life could take root,

Implorations flowed beneath the breath she had come to cherish.

They told her that despite all he had given to secure that which is fleeting

Damage to the passageways lingered in wait for the chance to snatch his joy.

Still, in her eyes which saw him 

There must be another way. 

So, share with us the story of a life lived.

Where their leftdoings protected our rights,

And what the world decided was enough

Never seemed to be for us, those who saw them.

That which is fleeting taught us to cherish the joy

And in a single instant wrenched it away from us all.

Sprinkling of moments that find value in absence. 

Memoirs inked in laughter on the darkest days.

Actions begot lessons we will never forget,

And at their worst they did their best.

Pity, we lost the time to forgive.

Yet in every moment shared,

We saw them with our eyes.

So maybe, that is enough.