(Pardon the profanity but) Nigeria is shit.

Nigeria is shit
But that morning akara be banging
   -- golden brown hot balls of blended beans and seasoning
       with a side of sugary pap
Oh, my

But Nigera is shit
With her stagnant open gutters teeming with trash and spirogyra
exhuding ghastly smells, breeding mutant mosquitoes
With her gaping roads being eaten by erosion
and haven't been fixed in years

But that suya is everything
   -- strips of spicy meat grilled over coal pits

But Nigeria still shit
With the wanton stealing, embezzling,
misappropriation of public funds
by the 'powers that be'
and now our hospitals don't work
our schools don't work
our power don't work

But, oh, that jollof be killing
   -- rice brought to the boil in peppery stew
       with a side of moin-moin,
       coleslaw and a cold bottle of Coke

Nigeria still shit, tho'
With headless leadership
declaring and partially implementing
policies and programs that never helped anybody

Nigerians the shit
Throwing billion-naira weddings
and lavish 50th birthday bashes
Throwing money away because they never did work for it anyway

And we are all insincere
so we be careful and don't complain all that much
can't write epistles about unjust military and elite classes
when the common man drives like a lunatic;
with disregard to laws and the right to safety
and freedom from harm of his fellow human  being

And where is my mouth?
When did I become righteous?
When was the last time I jumped a queue at the bank
and felt fulfilled?
Or made away with extra change from the newspaper seller
and said nothing?

We are shit
Yet we love the house of God;
love to give tithes and sadaqah
so that we feel less rotten
-- mix a little holiness in with our ugliness

Nigeria is shit
And what are we going to do about it?