Aurora
‘Twas a humid but hot night…
When I touched outside
Four miles away to be precise_
After I saw a documentary
On TV
Granules of yellow light sprayed off broken iron
As it slide across a jet of ethene_
The sight of it was pristine_
…I strolled toward this scene:
Showers of light fragments spread out
(In unison) like stage curtains
To make way
For the faint outline of a man
Wearing a pair of gloves, and a protective mask_
Holding the welders torch…
I relished the colors on display…
That was at large during the day
Meanwhile,
In my neighborhood
It was unheard of
A welder working at night shift
His section of the road_
I repeatedly overlooked_
Suddenly received my unwavering attention,
My mind floated adrift,
The experience that would follow, I guess
Would mean a lot to me…
But memory failed to remind brain
The happenings thereafter
I was cast into the Arctic Circle
By an angel of imagination
I was filled with the spirit of science
Like the biblical john
Transfixed into the Ireland of Patmos
The latter I must have to apply, thus
To relate my ordeal
But I am a scientist
And not a Christian
To be precise
On the same spot
I fixed my gaze to the skies
A shimmer of lights revealed itself
To my unaided eyes
Like an open scroll
To be precise
‘Twas a blanket of green-blue emissions
From the elements that were likely
To hold a stake
In life beneath
All the spectrum of white light
Made their mark
In curtain folds
Arranged in symmetry
And moving with rhythm in it
‘Twas strange there…
I didn’t feel cold…
The ice I stood upon felt wet (all of a sudden)
I withdrew my gaze from skyward
To the horizon
Catching sight of two sheriffs in a snow mobile
That made harness out of fuel
Closing up on me for being a wanderer…
I even forgot…
Imagination has no boundaries whatsoever
‘Twas weird, anyway
An African! Come to think of it…
Living side by side with Eskimo
I returned to West Africa (on deportation)
The Niger delta to be precise
The winds of agitation seemed to abate there
The kinsmen finally reap oil
For all their wish and toil_
But there was problem_
The outside world was recovering
From the consequences of oil glut
…But the engineers
...Indiscriminately lit gas flares
In oil facilities scattered here and there…
Like Olympic torches telling humanity
That those activities to mark
The worlds undoing
Has begun…
In contrast, few still campaign
In favor of clean emissions
On a planet where global warming
Had already taken its toll…
Dirty carbon and its allies... are members
Of the greenhouse family!
It’s just that they aren’t environmentally friendly;
They keep boring holes through the layer of ozone
The latter which is sunscreen
To life on earth
In the light of these warnings:
Find a solution to the oil addiction…
Use it as seed…
For bio-substances which are ecologically friendly…
‘Stead of striking a match to it...
…seems nobody listened all the while
On a spring equinox (12noon)
Rainy season to be precise
The conflict between light and darkness
Was the reason longer night to shorter day!
Became paradox
The sky went pitch black…
That the air was clothed in massive soot fumes
Was the reason why many babies…
Were choking to death
The ozone depleting substances which had spoiled the ozone…
Was the reason why cancer
Drew familiar to dark skin
‘Twas chaos everywhere
A common man need not be a scientist
To deduce that white light
Meant a whole lot to life
And black light
Has no spectrum…
Aurora lives nowhere
Save the atmosphere
Surrounding the poles
Where… the ozone above…
Have few holes
On its blanket
Where the elements
Lining the summit of the skies
Are so clean
As to produce… lights
That eventually transformed my life forever
Accounts rendered by arctic dwellers …
About the aurora borealis
Would make many want to flee
But… it did not even hurt
A black man like me_
Even in nightmare…
I regained consciousness
From what turned out to be some collapse
To find myself in the hospital bed
Beside a welder
“Please weld in my broken nerve fiber…”
I uttered loud …
“’twas a slip of tongue”
I quickly added_
…everybody in the room… burst in laughter
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