Days And Days Poem by Elliot Moore Ahiator

Waking up! Yawning and stretching like a Tom cat arousing from a Kingly rest.
I greet the new day. From a mattress on the floor handed down through two generations in a semi completed building all reality begins. Imaginations running helter skelter. Agenda: Koko and groundnuts from the vendor down the street. How to buy? Hands travel through the pockets of trousers dropped on the floor after a tiresome day chasing dreams and promises yet unfulfilled. And search, search, search. The wild goose chase! Every single pocket, every corner and every seam. Checked, rechecked and triple checked and Ahh. Denial gives in to heart-rending truth. Remembered. The trotro* fare from the night before, and agonizing laughter erupts as if in sync to my rumbling belly. Today na Today!

Suddenly I take notice of the radio blaring annoyingly, with the voice of some over pampered politician debating the state of the economy with words I barely understand. Can he be blamed? He is well fed and slickly dressed to boot I presume. Irritated, dial flipped and soothing music at last. Now to calming roaring tigers within belly. Who to call? The list of creditors exhausted. Back to the pursuit of my wild goose. My Sunday trousers comes to mind and lo! I jump hysterically clinging onto a 2 Ghana cedi note miracle like a kindergartener granted a Christmas wish.

Slowly I sit down to contemplate this life endured. Without forewarning, a man is called to be a man. To take on the world without wimper. To carry responsibilities under whose burden I keel over. Life, such a slave driver, delivering such hurt and welts from each whip lash even Jesus, might be jealous, if ever such vanity could be found in the divine. At wit's end, giving up seems the only available reprieve. The desire for an absolute end taunts, tempting and daring even. I assume that route to be mercy.
Hah! Lilliputian coward! A new day dawns to find me alive. It appears I do enjoy life regardless.

*Trotro - public transport in Ghana