I wondered as a boy

Why the flies always hovered

Around fluorescent lights

And one day, my mother said to me:

Kola, ọwọ́ epo laráyé ń bá’ní lá,

Ẹnikẹ́ni kìí bá‘ ni lá tẹ̀jẹ̀.

She asked me:

Do you see the flies hover in/around darkness?

I say no.

“When do you see them”, she asked?

“When there is light”, I said.

Ọwọ́ epo laráyé ń bá’ní lá,

Ẹnikẹ́ni kìí bá‘ ni lá tẹ̀jẹ̀.

Light attracts, and darkness repels.

Ọwọ́ epo laráyé ń bá’ní lá,

Ẹnikẹ́ni kìí bá‘ ni lá tẹ̀jẹ̀.

The tongue only lusts after sweetness,

The bitter things do not call to us naturally.

Ọwọ́ epo laráyé ń bá’ní lá,

Ẹnikẹ́ni kìí bá‘ ni lá tẹ̀jẹ̀.

Fame is no man’s foe.

The sugar cube lies there on its own,

Calls to no ants, but they come.

They come first in twos and threes

And then call unto others

Saying there is something for us here,

Come, let us make a home.

The sugar cube that welcomes every ant

Will soon be as a speck of dust.

A friend is not known in the crowd.

A friend is not known in the spotlight.

I asked her: Who then is my friend?

And she said: It is you first. Every time, it is you first.

“Who are the others after me”, I asked?

She said: Anyone who walks into your darkness

To experience it with you.

Ọwọ́ epo laráyé ń bá’ní lá,

Ẹnikẹ́ni kìí bá‘ ni lá tẹ̀jẹ̀.

The world licks the palms full of red oil;

No tongue craves the palms full of blood.

* Ọwọ́ epo laráyé ń bá’ní lá, enikẹ́ni kìí bá‘ ni lá tẹ̀jẹ̀ is a Yoruba proverb in South-western Nigeria loosely translated as “people follow after success, and no one looks in the direction of failure”.

Source: From the Rebel Issue (October 2019)

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