The Skeleton Says It All (Ode To Ichie Nwanonukpo) Poem by Victor Okechukwu Anyaegbuna

Honour denied integrity interred
Service divined mortally accomplished.
The finest of unsullied youth, in dearth,
Grieve and balk at the mess of deified earth
In joy concealed mental agitation.
For souls unborn, pains of incarnation
From immortality on borrowed time.
Integrity disintegrates at prime
Wailing the shock of wasted momentum.
The light and conscience of wit and dictum
With solemn reverence from a native might
And role of prudence, pierce honour's timed plight
And water probity with one accord.
The skeleton says it all, clear and loud!

On the cross of integrity he lived
And passed unsung, highly extolled yet dumped
By a country crying for rectitude.
A mortal failure in values of fraud
Denied for candour and sagacity,
Endangered for want of complicity,
Yet unruffled by stately unclean gains
consigned posterity on clouded panes;
The sway and agonies of penury
Which begrime the warrior's ascendancy,
Viciously threatening the path of reason
With destruction, to cow for submission.
Still the galactic ardour sustains.
Yes! His skeleton says it all, in chains!

Esteemed apostle of integrity
In mortal doom, in cold rigidity.
From early sunrise to dusky sunset
Decreasing, fading moment by moment
Silently protesting conspiracy
Against cherished norms by high class banditry.
The mystique drums and gongs ushered radiance
That killed the hard fangs of pain and distress.
In the prolonged battle for existence
Frail tears of rapture scuttle deserved peace.
Vanity at the peak of truth denied,
Trailing a soiled generation, famished,
Renting sweet balms of mission in the dust.
Yes! The skeleton says it all, and must!

On the grand sanctuary of probity,
Great mind passionate, endowed and mighty.
Come forth! Hear the clarion call to order
That 'wakens integrity from slumber.
Unto us is born in eternal lode,
A psyche in boundless joys, truth unvarnished.
Great soul atoned in the bosom of light
Beauty of life and majesty of height
Humility of power, essence of pride
Life, labour, dignity prized and reformed.
Behind the ghost, the sweet music still inspires
They, left in the great ill-wind as pillars.
Borne aloft, hell denied in mortal scowl.
Yes! Alas! The skeleton says it all!