There were six of us,
Travellers and Sojourners,
On the same path, we journeyed,
On the same path, we walked,
Until we parted ways,
One left for a path he said,
Led to a dream come true,
It wasn’t far too long,
He sank into the mire,
Another said he could see a distant light,
And that path he took,
He soared on eagle’s flight,
It was only transient,
He plummeted and crashed,
One also saw a path,
Excited and elated he was,
He said it would surely lead
to the apogee of his career,
He climbed but somewhere up,
A rung gave way,
He fell freely like a leaf off a tree,
Landed and broke an arm and a limb,
Another said he couldn’t go on anymore,
Unclear and uncertain,
Dark and dreary,
Everything he said seem to look,
He turned and left for
where we started off,
Perhaps we were not on the right track,
Just two of us left,
One optimistic,
The other ambivalent
One still onward bound,
The other lagging.
Thompson I. Emate is a graduate of University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria. His keen interest in creative writing particularly prose and poetry has seen him spend most of his leisure time writing these two. He has his poems, “Foot Soldier” and “Lilies” published in a youth magazine. He lives in Lagos, Nigeria.