SUICIDE NOTE OF A NIGERIAN YOUTH

If you read this note then I must be gone
Hanging from the leaking roof of my one-room home
the rope was painful but all I could afford
For I had no money to buy a suicide drug

I tried, I tried God knows I tried
But if I'm not tired then I must have lied
All my life all I knew was pain
Hunger and tears with satan to blame

So it goes with me that I went to school
Arduous and tough but I kept my cool
Stumbled and stood through all the strikes
Took me eight years for a course of five

Long last I'm out with a paper degree
Hoping to share in the federal alawee
I served naija in the sun and rain
In the north I was mobbed another corper was slain

Its five years on still have no job
My girl left me; no money no love
The rent is out and I'll sure be thrown out
Life in the city's for the rich with clout

How can I cope when I can't buy a job
Or a note from a senator for a job with the law
I strived I toiled but it seems I'm cursed
I walk through the city and hope is lost

If your dad is politician your life is best
You'll be served first even if you came last
You'll drive a big car and own a big phone
You'll get married quick even if your live in dad's home

Alas I'm hungry and my dad is poor
I have one shirt and I sleep on the floor
Yesterday I slept hungry and I owe mallam shai
Government doesn't care and I'm sure I'll die

The poor are cursed and the rich are blessed
Nigeria is hell and life is a hex
There's heaven there's hell and you have none twice
I didn't choose this, I didn't roll the dice

If here is hell then I'll sure go to heaven
I've served my time though sour and uneven
Don't tell my mum I killed myself
Please tell her I died in the night while I slept

I have no will with none to give
All I leave are these last words I weave
My diary and these weary words I wrote
My last breath all out in this suicide note