Earthquakes of Childhood

They are just children but have known pain, seen pain, dwelled with pain and condemnation and they are never allowed to voice out this due to the myopic reasoning of our African mentality.

They say "this thing ought not to be said by children; they are too young for this talk". Not knowing they are not helping them but rather expanding their earthquakes.

These little children are most times subject to molestation and assault at a very tender age and when they try to talk about it, they are blamed for been too playful and free with their Uncles or Aunties. Who else are they to be free with if not family? hmm.....

Some have been forced to be spectators to this heinous, disgusting act but still victims as their childhood are been marred for life.

Children who have gone through hell but still have no voice to be heard,
Children who evil have been perpetrated by people they believed to be Family.

They live in homes turned to war-zones by abusive and warrior like parents.
They wake up to the sound of their mother's been battered in the glory of belts and punches.
Their fathers feed with the blessings of their mothers abuse, their eyes are filled with the rape of their own mothers and siblings.

And then you say they are not the direct victims, just the witness of a nightmare which continues to linger in their lifetime.

They scream and cry for help beneath muffled sounds as they are sad casualties of the cold war.
Memories that should be with Joy are now built on nightmares oh...
What a disaster!

Then this children grow up with scars, empty gaze filled with hell. They are rapped within layers of bitterness. A brutal rape,
a bitter abusive wife,
a drunken cheating abusive husband,
a heinous touch by respected relative, alters the lives of these children and are left speechless with no voice to speak for them because of the myopic reasoning children don't say things like this.

                    - Adepoju Joy Sidikatu

                  (adepojuebunomolayo@gmail.com)