Lines from a victim of child labour
Itunumi Solace ✍�

As I watch the world
From my horizons, my full air conditioned apartment
My doors are always ajar, all routes lead in me....
Come in, visitor like me, I have water, and I have tears to offer...

I am a product of two dreamers, sent to the streets cos dreams die too,
I fend for myself, and wherever the night catches me, is my motel for the day... I get lucky to find an apartment at franzaki park. But my favorite spot is the cele bridge where I could see the amazing cars I could only dream about zoom pass by....
Water and tears is all I have to offer....

I am a bag of bones, with tattered flesh across the seven deadly plagues of history, I have grown older than my age, for my wide range of Odyssey across the bridges of Lagos
Welcome still to my home, I have water and tears to offer...

Every night before I sleep, in the security of my maker,
I pray, only to be taken off the streets, or wake up in a paradise I envisioned in the afterlife, I have no clothes except the shelters from the ice water I sell,
My eyes are swollen, as the stronger men take away my hard earned wealth...
But welcome stranger I have waters and tears to offer

Have you seen my sister,
She sells everything, and I mean everything just to stay alive,
How can I blame her, when I can't help her, she's only to tender to pass through the sharp knives of life
From the midday heat, down to the store where her body is weigh per kilo,
Welcome stranger, water and tears is all I can offer

Tonight my cowries are much, I am happy
This period I have a lot to eat at night, those who prostate five times a day, feed me at every seven P. M, and on Sunday, the singers of praise offer me alms, am very much happier than I was yesterday
Welcome stranger, water and tears is all I have.....

Don't blame me for not being in the classroom,
I love to see the board, and hear the stories of how free education is,
But I prefer my sister to go, for the streets treat her with harsh justice,
I might be tender but I understand the language of the irate
When I grow I hope to change things according to the streets
Then blood and sweat might be all I can offer you stranger.......

Solace anthology✌�