The crowd I gathered for goodbye
Oluwagbenga Abiola@oluwagbengaabiola322369
6 days ago
The Crowd I gathered for goodbye
All my life, I was planting footsteps on roads I would never walk again.
Smiling at strangers, feeding friendships, watering names like gardens,
not knowing I was only gathering flowers
for a day I would not smell them.
I built tables for laughter,
yet the loudest gathering would be when my chair is empty.
I spent years answering every knock,
only to become the silence behind the final door.
How strange is man
he chases shadows, counts coins, polishes pride,
yet the only crowd guaranteed
is the one that follows his coffin.
Some will cry rivers with borrowed tears,
some will wear black with hearts still colorful,
some will speak of love they never showed
while I was warm enough to hear it.
Life is a marketplace of temporary faces.
Today they hail you like sunrise,
tomorrow they forget you like yesterday’s weather.
The tongue has no bone,
yet it breaks hearts more than hammers break stones.
So now I know:
give flowers while hands can receive them.
Speak kindness before lips become history.
Hold those you love before time steals their names
and hangs them in memory like old portraits.
For in the end,
we spend our youth gathering people,
our strength carrying burdens,
our years chasing wind
only to discover
the longest journey of life
is the short walk
where others carry us home.
Written by @oluwagbengaabiola322369
#Nirclepoetry #Readmystories #untanglingafricanchain #Nigeria #Literature #forumnircle
