Everything cometh and goeth, like sun rises and sunsets. Vanishing into the abyss of our memories, like a mirage in the desert. Nothing seems to be permanent, stable, without fluctuation. Even time can’t fight it, as it trickles down, slowly but ever so surely. Nothing seems to be long lasting. Nothing seems to be forever.

We continue to go on like it doesn’t matter, like we aren’t all thinking the same thing. The inevitable, death. That experience we cannot but face, whether we be standing chin high to face it or ducking for cover as it charges onward to meet us, we, being prepared or not.
Smiles switch to frowns that switch to smiles and frowns over again; the unending conundrum Spins endlessly as we go onward with our lives, knowing our inevitable faith. Worrying never seems to solve anything, most certainly not this universal problem. We do it anyway, like some human impulse to stress. Rather than embrace it, accept it, fuse with it like birds in the sky, like fishes in the sea. We reject it, reject the obvious, reject our already plotted path. And why won’t we? , why won’t we fight for what we believe in?, for a future beyond the cold yard gates of death. For eons we be fighters, whether it be for our liberty or for our pride, blacks and Spartans alike, we have always been fighters. Never giving up, even when death cometh knocking on our very gates, when she stretches out her hands and grabs us by the neck, slowly choking the very life out of us. We wriggle none the less, with our last breath, we wriggle, less we be the next passengers on Kharon’s boat.
The question that many of our most brilliant minds have failed to even ask , talk less of answer is, why do we really live?. Why do we breathe, and love and hope and dream and believe. Many of us never seem to ask this, never even conjure it in our very narrow minds, filled with superficial dreams of what we want and how we want to get there. But the truth be, why do we want these things?, will it make us more comfortable ? More important ? Happier? . Will it stop that unwanted guest, death , from knocking on our doors?.
If we be as shallow enough to believe that, to believe that we are born for ourselves, then humanity is surely damned.
What then is life?, I pray ye. A play that has entrapped all of us, regardless of creed, race, nationality, gender, age. Forcing us to do her bidding, to act what we believe to be right; to live for ourselves, believing that we be permanent characters in its play, forgetting that we be dispensable, that we can be, and most certainly are going to be kicked into what we fear the most, the arms of her twin, death. cast in her own play. A play that no one ever watches. Therefore, can’t we thus say that we be merely travelers? , passing through this jungle to yonder? , and if then we be travelers, shan’t we be less greedy?, selfish, self centered. Shan’t we strive to leave something more important than a tombstone Inshrined into the earth for of course, riches cannot make the journey with us to yonder. Isn’t a travelers duty, besides seeing and striving to experience, struggling to see all that he can in the small window of his apartment?, over looking the city he has come to see, but only for a short time. Shan’t he then, knowing all this, fight , not to survive per-say, but also to leave a lasting legacy. Because , of course, he is a mere traveler, simply passing through.

Written by Obinna Obioma.