Bethel C. Simeon
Nigeria
Bethel C. Simeon
With the fiery conviction of a pastor on a pulpit, with a sincerity of concern about the state of humanity this poet poses weighty questions around our collective sabotage of our potential and our almost unnatural tendency for self-destruction. Using the gravity of words in quite a classical style of expression he gives the poem a kind of grandeur, delivered by a rich and confident voice perfectly suited for his message.
BIOGRAPHY
Born and bred in Nigeria, Bethel .C. Simeon, a singer, a songwriter, and a preacher, describes hi... More >
Antithesis to Progression
What mammal dare deny the progression of her constitution?What chick contends that time chronicles the alteration of her plumage?Immortality is not the fate of infancy.Permanence is not the lot of adolescence.Who dare protest the progression to adulthood.This too must herald the entrance of the grey hair.Progression.The tide that embellishes our voyage with novelty and the unexplored treasures of the treasure house.Why do you tread on the retrogressive paths that bind your feet with the shackles of stagnation? Has blindness dislodged the sight that beholds the atrocities of primordial ways?Away with the fossilized formulas of stagnation.Away with the cultures that bestow volumes of ruins on her practitioners.Orators of this backwardness must not prohibit the eyes that see from roaming the length and breath of our habitation.The ruins cannot be collected in baskets.Consider now and call for the mourners. For lamentation has become the exigent enterprise if we must stem the tide of the ruins of these antiquated ways.Consider your ways.Unclog the cluttered minds.Let the intellect ascend the throne.Let wisdom design the colours of your formula.We must chastise the proclivities the shape this indulgence.Morality cannot be ascribed to the paths that bequeath the legacies of destructions.Morality is the appellation we affix to conventions that do no wrong.The meal of retrogression is garnished with spices that kill and maim.The transient aroma of pleasure has pulled the wool over the eyes that are designed to see.The enrollment of legions into the academy of vices cannot make it a virtuous citadel.Rivers and ocean cannot wash away the spot that is embalmed in the tomb of eternity.Do good to a spade by calling it the name that creation assigned to it.What story shall we tell posterity when it inquires about the birth of this aberration?Shall we contend with logics of falsehood and cowardice?When tomorrow comes will my unborn child applaud the ways that bequeath her with the legacies of pain and ashes?Will her lips speak the language of mockery?Will her voice vent vituperations and curses on the grave of the man who laid the foundations of misery/Can we x-ray these deeds of contention on the scale that weighs with the sharp sword of honesty.Where are the hearts that pant for the redemption of these captives of antiquated ways? Do not cast off this burden of divine origin.Streams of antagonism. Tongues of sarcasm and eyes of disdain are coming.Emissaries of obstruction are coming. They are coming with brittle courage and weightless bravery.They are coming with the facade of fear and words of terror.They are coming with subtle schemes of deception and the snares of slavery.Arise! Arise and take the spot of bravery. Wield the sword that sparkles with truth and liberation.Arise and ascend to the mountain top.Blow the trumpet with the force that cannot be denied.Speak the words that resound within the habitation of deaf ears.Roll away the curse of slumber and lethargy.Ignite the embers of celestial fire.Call for the baptism of change on the souls that are trapped in the abbeys of retrogression.The gathering of the clouds speaks of imminent rainfall.Open your arms and embrace the inevitable.
