why do you want to marry me?

Why do you want to marry me?

Is it for the public cheers

For ever moving age inducing fears

Hope it’s not for those calls without

For the calls within will soon die

Like recalcitrant ogbanje they come and go

Why do you want to marry me

Hope it’s not to be like John

Note my name is not Jean

And life is not a tag team match

Is it ‘cos they hug and kiss and love

Mind you they also fight

And tear selves like venomous foes

The bed is not what it shows

Why do you want to marry me

B’cos your friends have rushed into it

As if whipped by diarrhoea on the butt

Into a dirty public loo

Mind you they are rushing out

B’cos the loo will always ooz

Why do you want to marry me

Hope it’s not for my pretty face

‘Cos beauty is everywhere

But when the sun will come

The face will wither and lose its milk

And shrink with a million freckles

Like a baboon’s hairless butt

Why do you want to marry me

Hope it’s not for my outward frame

My shape of an hour glass

Will just in an hour sag

Like empty raffia sac relieved of stones

It will droop like hibiscus in a hot sun

Why do you want to marry me

Is it for my smooth oily skin

That glows and radiates warmth

Soon it will wrench and shrivel

Like sandpaper it will roughen

And harden like palm kernel shells

Why do you want to marry me

It’s not for my firm fluffy breasts

That dangle like mango fruits

They too will soon flab

Like punctured balloon tubes

And sag like scrotum in intense heat

They will lay dried and flaccid

Like rubber slippers they will sleep

Never to wake again

Why do you want to marry me

So you can wear the black suit

And say “I do” before the church

For what you have always done

A fragile unsteady vow

Broken in every home

Why do you want to marry me

Not for what we did last night

When we moan and cuddle like cats

Hiding away from Mum and Dad

Do you just need a bed certificate

To sleep bare in guiltless bed

I guess you should ask the dead

They are tired of eating sleep

If you want me in a gown

Mind you my colour is pink

Why do you want to marry me

You need a fruit of the womb

An heir to wear your shoes

Is your mother pushing you

I guess she too has a womb

What if my womb is dried

And dead like kilinshi suya

Why do you want to marry me

Why?