Philip Abayomi Olorunfemi Poet Free verse

The Toll Gate Called Bank

In this republic of ledgers and silence,
Nigeria breeds a curious alliance;
bank and state,
two wrestlers in one ring,
tag-teaming the trembling customer.

Here, money travels a punished road.
It pays to arrive,
it pays to depart,
it even pays rent
for merely breathing in the vault.

An account;
not a shelter,
but a toll gate
where every passing kobo
must bow.

Yesterday a friend spoke:
three hundred dollars a quiet seed
planted in a domiciliary field.

Years ripened.
He returned with the calm of ownership.

But the bank replied with a bureaucratic smile:
“Your money has been
faithfully used for maintenance.”
Maintenance?

Tell me;
did they polish the silence
around the digits?
Did they dust the air
that guarded the balance?

Did they feed the ghosts
that watch over accounts at night?
Had a stranger done this
we would sharpen the word theft.
Sirens of outrage
would rise like storm birds.

But when the bank performs
this arithmetic magic,
we rename the wound
banking and clap politely
when profit climbs
into billions.

The saddest Mathematics remains:
a nation so accustomed
to daylight pickpockets in suits
that even the robbed
nod in agreement,
and call it normal.

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