REGENERATION

                                      

January 14^th 2012 10:00am

 …Within, the fiery serpent of disease slithered and slid with languid insouciance while emitting sibilant hisses of triumph.  Repulsive scaly, skin glistened and rippled while swimming in the darkness of her body, through blood, over cells and organs. It had broken through the puny defenses activated by the prey’s body. A tiny worm a couple of months ago when it started its destructive expedition, it had fed, devoured, consumed and wolfed down Shanty’s essence as it burrowed through her...

 Silence hangs in the room like an oppressive pall of dark clouds. A hush follows the death knell uttered by the Professor Emeritus of Medicine, “I am sorry but you only have three more months to live”. I am stunned and tears sting my eyelids -like a Portuguese Man-of War-, the drops heavy as lead. The alchemy of pain going on within me crystallized the salty rivers brimming in my eyes into diamonds of distress and prisms of anguish through which the whole world becomes hazy and foggy.

Drowning in the flood of a sorrowful brew of confusion, sobs and weeping, I gasp, “It cannot be”! After the futility of my last trip to India, the professor is my last hope. With his vast experience and degrees, he is the best in the United States; the halo of grey on his head, his quiet dignity and the array of certificates and awards on his wall all testify to this. I look into his eyes, way beyond his horn rimmed specs and all I can behold are pools muddied by hopelessness and despondency. I leave his consulting room numb all over with a voice screaming in my head, “You are going to die”! This time my father’s billions cannot save me.

April 10^th 2012 8:00pm

...She got wasted while the serpent grew and grew into an unimaginable size. The serpent’s venomous poison was now circulating within her core and the last destinations were the lungs and heart.  Another victim was about to bite the dust...

I lay on the hospital bed awaiting the grim reapers sickle. All my flesh is gone. I have become a mass of raggedy bones and would rattle like a toy skeleton if you ever shook me. I do not look into the mirror anymore because the person I visualize these days is a stranger I never knew. Every ounce of energy has been leached out of my body as I await death. My last PCV was rock bottom low. Life has become an embarrassment, I cannot walk anymore and all my natural calls are carried out on my bed. The only song I seem to hear these days is the ping of the life-sustaining machines. For me, the struggle is over, I have stopped fighting.  However, I know I am not ready. I cannot get it out of my mind that all my technicolour dreams have diminished into nothingness with the consistency of a mirage in a desert. Life is just not fair. After graduating with a PHD from Harvard, the whole world awaited me and then this!  I am never going to get married, have kids, and travel the world like I had always envisaged. My whole body is racked with despondency and the unfairness of it all. My life had distilled into a river of tears which recently has gotten desiccated and dried up, a watering hole in the wilderness that the harsh rays of the sun has sucked life out of. Snaky tubes feed vital infusions into me with steely fangs...

April 10^th 2012 8:00pm

…the daggers of its fangs sank into the soft core of her lungs. The toxin bathed and saturated her tissues. …

Layi has come to visit this evening and if I was not in bed, I would have fled for dear life. She totes the bible more than a guerrilla totes an AK 47. It is commonly said that religion has been mixed into her staple cassava meal. Her passion for her religious mania can set the Atlantic ablaze. The only reason I abide her is that she is about the most loving person you would ever meet in this world. However, the last thing I want on this earth is her preaching but I am too tired to protest. Moreover, I have nothing to lose since I have explored every other option. She leaves after finishing her business (the most heartfelt prayer I have ever heard, coupled with pouring some Goya olive oil on my head). Surprisingly, I catch myself saying a heartfelt "amen" to her prayer...

...gliding all the way to the heart, it raised its head, opened its mouth to reveal mean looking fangs with shimmering gems of saliva on them. Drops that reflect malevolence and death...

Suddenly I start wheezing, choking and gasping for breath. The nurse checking my charts promptly attaches an oxygen mask to my face and calls the doctor. I know without being told that the end has come. Everything becomes so surreal. A tunnel appears before me, darker than night and as thick as black congealed pap. All around I hear the frantic fluttering of the wings of a thousand bats. Fear has paralyzed me. I do not want to die!

... As it was about to strike, a flaming sword out of nowhere beheaded it with lightening speed. It writhed and flailed in agony until it disappeared in a puff of smoke…..

In the midst of all the frenetic happenings in my room, the door opens and a man walks in, the most beautiful person I have ever seen. From Him emanates living light (that is the best way I can describe the brilliance that has suffused the room); blades of sunlight that sliced the darkness into tendrils of nothingness. Everything and everybody in the ward become shadows in his luminosity. Instinctively I know He is the one that Layi has always spoken about, the King she had invited to come and heal me, the Son of God. He is invisible to every other person in the room as He draws a chair close and touches me. His touch is the gentlest ever. We have a conversation that makes me know that Layi has always been right while I am the wrong one, deaf as a door post and more blind than a bat. I cannot resist His love and I get up and give Him a hug such that I hear His heart beating out my name.

As I squeeze Him to the last inch of my life, I feel something strange happening. I open my eyes to see He has transformed into a being that has no beauty whatsoever, He has no comeliness that can make me desire Him. I draw back in horror and astonishment without being able to tear my eyes from His visage. I notice that He has gone through excruciating punishment. Someone has whipped him so much that His whole body has ripped flesh hanging down from the ghastly stripes laid by the whip. Ribbons of hanging skin festooned His broken and battered form. The grisly bloody garlands cover Him like Lei on the neck of a Hawaiian visitor. As I gaze, my emotions roil like a mass of agitated eels, through a spectrum of horror, to shock, to astonishment and finally to worship. I kneel down and bow…

He changes back to His original form, carry me to the bed, bless the bread by my bedside and my water and feeds me (funny, the bread suddenly tastes fresh, crusty and sweet, my first solid meal in a while). He then sets up a transfusion for me on a cross shaped infusion stand different from any other I have seen in the hospital...

April 17^th 2012 2pm

I sleep until 12 noon and wake up feeling very different. The oxygen is off, the machines have stopped pinging. The doctors and nurses are looking at me with amazement. The barrage of tests come out negative. I am discharged within a week. As I walk out of the hospital's glass doors into the sunshine, I remember the Sun of Righteousness and the healing on His wings. Layi’s words that day play in my head as I am being driven home……

He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities, the chastisement of our peace was upon Him and by His stripes we were healed…………

© 2013 Ekpo Ezechinyere

ST. VALENTINE, THE PHANTOM OF FEBRUARY 14TH

                                              

If you have been following my blog for a while now, you would know that I do not care diddly squat about Saint Valentine’s Day. It is not that I am constantly in an over sized armoured suit that prevents Cupid's arrow from getting close to my heart. On the contrary, I am an incurable romantic maybe way more than you even are (so do not give me that condescending look). I believe in star-dust filled ambiance and slow motion hugs, a weekend get away with the wife, roses and chocolates. Lately, I have even been thinking of a way to bottle the moon and a couple of stars to give my Amor as a gift, to enlighten her heart when the light of my love for her seems to dim a tad. However, in a world where bombs and bullets are given instead of hugs and kisses, slaps and fisticuffs are distributed instead of goodwill and harmony; to take out one day where we all go wild celebrating something we know zilch about is an elaborate charade.

A lot of madness is going on in the world but let me use my beloved Nigeria as a microcosm of the globe. This is one country where selfishness and greed fester to unimaginable proportions. Most peeps live with the creed of me, myself and I. Decisions are almost never made based on how it will favour the next person but for self-centered pecuniary reasons. Bus drivers knowing they do not have enough fuel to undertake journeys would do so anyway so long as they can collect some cash from the passengers before the vehicle stops on the road. Even if it is in the middle of the bush on a Monday morning, they do not give a hoot. Cross country transport companies would put faulty buses on the road and write on their tickets that fares are not refundable. I do not even want to talk about airlines; their own issues are on another dimension. Health personnel would jolly well know a case is beyond their expertise but would keep patients on the wards to make some quid, when the person is about expiring they would now refer so that it would not be said that the sick individual died in their hospitals. Lagos state government officials (touts with uniforms) would pounce on unwitting drivers like hyenas on wounded lambs and whisk them off to their offices on the pretense of putting down their names as first offenders, then slam N10, 500 fines on them after impounding their cars. These officials plus policemen remove road signs deliberately sometimes to catch “offenders” who will line their pockets with money. In Nigeria, laws are not made to protect but to punish, punishment that would accumulate more dough for the punisher. Petrol station owners would sabotage PHCN efforts to generate power so that the nation would continue being connected to the umbilical cords of the fuel pumps. Charlatans parading as clergy would rip off the undiscerning to get more prophetic offerings. We should be the last people on earth making so much noise about Valentine’s Day!

It occurred to me recently that when people run away from this country in search of a better life outside our shores what they are really running away from is the selfishness, greed and wickedness. Reason being that if our leaders were not consumed by the vices stated above, then Nigeria would be even better than the countries we run to in terms of infrastructure and better standards of human living. The difference between us and these other countries is not in the preponderance of natural resources but it is just that people there, out of love for themselves and others, put things in place to make sure their citizens live comfortably at least to the barest minimum.

Thing about inventions is that they usually make the inventor well off financially but beyond that they make life easier for people. Nigerians love money. In fact, we are probably the greediest people alive which explains most of the evil that abound in this nation (419, ritual killing, embezzlement, corruption, name it), so if money were the greatest motivation behind inventions then Nigerians should be way up on Fortunes’ totem pole. However beyond money, the greatest inspiration behind creativity is love. God loved man so much, that He created an Eden filled with gold and every beautiful thing imagined so that life would not be tedious for Adam. Love fired up God’s creativity. How many inventions to help humanity have come out of Naija?

For most people, Valentine is all about the sex. Deceptive sex by the way, in the sense that these people profess all the love in the world with only one reason behind it (it is common knowledge to dudes that the fastest way to get into a lady’s underwear in this country is by professing love and declaring marriage). They bequeath gifts of flowers only to reap and steal sacred flowers they know they are not entitled to. I am sure this makes the Saint nauseously sick in his grave. For others It is all about the getting, the grabbing. A dude is made to feel like the bees knees so that he can part with some goodies but it is usually a sham. After the acquisition of the latest toy from him, his heart is put on an anvil and smashed with a sledge hammer. The Black widow then walks away whistling, preparing her trap for the next love sucker, 2014’s the poor schmuck. Kudos sis, you sure are a master of this game.

As funny as it might sound, in this climate the muses of St. Valentine do not even thrive. Can you imagine you getting home after your car has been impounded for no just cause to find PHCN at their darkest best and no fuel to run your generator because somebody somewhere is hoarding it for greater profit and you suddenly becoming the most romantic Romeo on earth? Even if Cupid’s projectile were a nuclear weapon, it would most likely not make a dent on your heart. It would take some doing folks to become "Dude Love".

So, please save me all the hullabaloo and shenanigans of the 14^th of February and let us start the real celebration of love today by putting other people first. Let us start loving by treating others the way we want them to treat us. Let us begin to love our neighbours as ourselves. Let us all strive to put the phantom of St. Valentine out of his misery and make him real everyday and not just on one phoney day. This is why it was eternally written not just for today but for ever…..

Let brotherly love continue…..

UJU.....

                                                             

Darkness closed around me claustrophobically like barn walls around stockpiled yams. Thing is, I am even feeling all shrivelled up inside like stored yam. For the first time, the chorus of chirping crickets and croaking frogs refused to give me much needed surcease. Sleep fled my eyes like an elusive antelope flees a bullet from a hunter’s dane gun. Through the broken thatch roof of my home, the stars winked at me inexorably and merrily, unperturbed by my troubled state. Thankfully, the rains have stopped, if not the night would have been more miserable than this. The torrential rush of “Aguiyi” River during the rainy season seems quite placid comparatively to how my insides churned. A roaring churning made worse by the ravaging hunger which a few roasted cocoyams dipped in congealed palm oil could not abate.  The despondent bleating of the lone goat outside surmised my whole situation aptly, I was frustrated, hungry, tired and wretched.

The town criers message two market days ago still rung in my soul like his gong, a painful resonance that refused to be drowned. Ujuebuka (prodigious abundance, expansive wealth), the princess, was going to be given to the winner of a king organised wrestling contest and whoever won was also going to get half the kingdom to boot. The news was like a death blow to me. I LOVE HER!!! I ought to have carried the palm wine for her marital rites before now but since my father was not an Nze and we were dirt poor, the “Eze of Umudo”, her father, would hear none of it. He had been trying to convince her since forever that ours was puppy love and a dejected, poverty ridden person like me was not meant for the palace. He said I was a leper enveloped by the sores of penury, an outcast. Ah! How that rankles! Yet, looking around my hovel, I knew the Eze was not far from the truth. Worse still, she had been barred from seeing me! I missed the sweetness of her voice and her brilliant sheen that made it seem she constantly bathed with “eluaku”, palm kernel oil. I continuously tell her she must have been sculpted out of burnished, black bronze and that she sways when she walks like the reeds along the riverbank when the evening wind blows. Eewww, Ujuebuka, obim, my heart! Hot tears of self pity burnt and scarred my eyelids.

I met “Ajomadu”, the prince of Mmuoku, yesterday and he had laughed me to scorn. He had always so wanted to win my Uju’s hand but she would not even grace his brooding dark presence with a smile. The prince was the best wrestler in the seven clans and also the richest. It is said that it takes two men to carry each yam harvested from his farms. Furthermore he has a mean streak and is quite fetish. Rumour has it that he is backed by “Agbara” the most evil of the earth gods. As I walked past him lost in the forest of my thoughts, he called out to me “beggar lover, you have finally lost eh”. “I cannot wait to lay my hands on you during the competition”. I nearly urinated on myself as fear clawed at my innards like an angry leopard. The last person the evil prince wrestled with is still crippled and I know he detests me because my love preferred me. Fear or not though, I was going to fight for her hand or die trying. For Obim, I would dare the evil forest even if I have to lose my life.

“The seed of the Iroko never looks like the Iroko”, I keep hearing Papa say as he laid, wasted on his death bed. We could not even afford to buy the meagre things needed by the priest for the divination that ought to make him whole. However, he told me before his demise that the secret for a change of our status was for me to meet “Okeosisi” the High Priest who lives where the hills meet the skies in “Eligweuwa” the land where the sun never sets. “It is too late for me now son, your great grandfather told me to go on this quest but I decided to consult the priests of our land instead and found out they were all charlatans with oracles that are full of lies. By the time the truth dawned on me, it was too late and I spent the rest of my days trying to cultivate our cursed earth which was back breaking, fruitless work. “My son, the seed is in you but for you to become an Iroko, you must find Okeosisi” he rasped.

Initially, I thought my father was just talking from the delirium of a fever ravaged mind. However, his sayings stuck to me like water on a rain drenched rat and refused to dry up, long after his demise. Since I had nothing to lose, I took my raffia bag, blunt cutlass and off I went to Eligweuwa.

It was hard going! The journey was tedious and tough. I must have been out of my mind to have believed my father and undertaken this journey. The country I sought was where the skies met the hills, a place where most people never reach. However, as a rule, I do not start what I don’t finish, so I stuck to my mission doggedly.

I finally got there and it was the most beautiful land I had ever seen. The fountains were clean and clear and sprung out of the ground with a lively force. They were filled with all sorts of beautiful fish even the ones I had never seen in River Aguiyi. There was honey, fruits and game everywhere. If not for Uju, I would have built a camp here and never gone back. When I took a sip of the water to assuage my thirst, I felt I would never thirst again for the rest of my life. I broke out of my reverie and sought out the High Priest.

I finally found Him in a tent amongst a grotto of trees. He was so old with hair whiter than the whitest lamb in the whole of Umudo. On the other hand, He was so agile, so full of life that the air around Him seemed to crackle like the heavens before a storm. His eyes were so merry, so kind, and so full of laughter and love. “Ikemefuna” welcome He said.

I was dazed with surprise! “How did you know my name ”?

“Before you were conceived, I knew you”. Look at my hand, He replied, stretching forth his hand for me to take a proper look at.

“Ewooooo” I cried! My name was engraved on His palm, amongst many others but mine was of the biggest print, and seemed to fill the whole hand.

“If you knew me, how come you never revealed Yourself to me”, I asked.

“I did but you never noticed and the way it works is that you can only find me when you search for me with all your heart, Okeosisi replied. I know why you are here and you have come to the right place”. 

“Are you sure old man”?

Anger flashed in his eyes like lightening.

“I WOULD SELF DESTRUCT BEFORE MY ORACLES LIES!  If you can believe, all things are possible boy! I am called Okeosisi because my words have NEVER FAILED and would never!

You will defeat Ajomadu but it is not through your power or by your might that this will be achieved. Your arms of flesh will not prevail, they will fail you abysmally! You would have to key into the power that made the heavens and earth boy to beat your opponent"!

I went to my knees, “I believe Father”!

“Good, my son, very good”!

He killed a lamb and washed me in its blood. To my surprise, He cut Himself and allowed the blood to drip into an earthenware cup, and then also cut part of His flesh. “For your transformation to take place, you will need to enter a covenant with me by eating my flesh and drinking my blood”. I gasped and baulked in horror but looking into His eyes, I could see He was very serious! My flesh like pounded yam would give you strength and since the life of anything is in its blood, drinking mine would flood you with my life” He continued. So I obeyed. Lastly, he brought out a ram horn filled with the sweetest smelling oil ever and anointed me. I felt reborn!

…….the match was over and Ajomadu was still on the floor writhing in pain like a beheaded serpent. He could not believe it!  The whole village was agog as the drums thumped and throbbed crazily! A new champion had been born.

All the excitement was lost on me as I hugged Ujuebuka to my bosom, revelling in the softness of her love like a weaver's egg in its nest. My heart felt like a broken gourd that was carrying sweet palm-wine of joy which had now spilled into every fibre of my being.  As rivulets of tears flowed down our eyes, I looked up to the hills from whence came my help and muttered a silent thank you.

 ……THOU ANNOINTEST MY HEAD WITH OIL, MY CUP RUNNETH OVER!!!

                                                                                                                           © 2013 Ekpo Ezechinyere

AD 2013:....ENLARGEMENT (3)

CONTINUED FROM PART 2……………………………

 ……….I was born crippled, weak, misshapen and as ugly as sin on planet Niquitous. My progenitors were the fore-runners of a group of scientists groomed by The Elyon to dominate the planet (then the planet was part of Elyon’s Haven) through their discoveries and creativity. While experimenting with a fruity radioactive material they were specially warned not to touch, their bloodlines got corrupted with “transgressoma”, a deadly cancer, hence my nature. Instead of my pro-creators being remorseful for thwarting Elyon’s orders, they laid the blame at His feet for putting the fruit within their reach in the first place. They declared civil war and seceded and that was how Niquitous came about.

Niquitous was about the ugliest planet in the universe, but we Niquitousians loved it. It was filled with gigantic black pigs and mud ponds.  We got such orgasmic joy from cavorting in the mud that we could never dream of leaving or turning our back on our beloved world. To us nothing in Haven compared to the joys of reveling we experienced there. The orgiastic parties we had coupled with drinking, binging, and smoking made Haven the most boring place in the universe and we had none of its prudish, anal laws. Furthermore Haven’s streets made us claustrophobic, they were absolutely too narrow!

Despite our secession, The Elyon still sent His emissaries for peace talks and when that was to no avail, He came Himself and it was on one of those visits that he cut off a part of his heart to show He was ready to allow harmony reign at all costs. I had never seen so much blood, so much love, and so much commitment and could not turn my back on such an extravagant display even though my fellow citizens trampled on the sacrifice and spat on it. I followed Him to Planet Haven to be adopted as a son.

Then I was taken to Nicodemus lab where I was given a bloodbath and reconstituted. Injected with the DNA materials of The Elyon through a baptismal infusion with His serum and fed with pure milk from the many breasted dairies of Shaddai, the old “Reedy Adam” gave way to new “Rock Christos” a Super Soldier who joined the platoon of the DCC Light Forces. Parakletos was involved in the whole new birth process and two things he always drummed into my ears during the initiation were “Whatsoever is born of Elyon overcomes the cosmos” and “He that is me is greater than he that is in the cosmos”….

……then the world went black. I came to with life with those words ringing in my ears like a million bells, gently eased out of my wrecked ship and tried to orient myself with my surroundings. Weak and groggy, having lost a lot of blood, out of the corners of my eyes, I saw the “fallen ones” converging on me like hyenas on a wounded lion.

Thankfully my wireless was still intact and I sent an SOS to the “Throne” (seat of Haven’s security headquarters). “Agent Rock supplicating, I need Elyon’s hand”. This hand was an intangible transcendental mantle that released from the Throne gives superhuman strength (this was what enabled Elijah out-run the chariot of Ahab effortlessly). It was released upon me before I even saw the eagle that delivered it.

I became a living weapon, a battle axe and ran through their troops, teeth gritted, eyes in slits, nothing was going to stand before my destiny, and nothing was going to stop my enlargement, especially not these suckers!

Remembering the clips shown of Eleazer the son of Dodo during my training in the war room, where his hand stuck to his sword when he had to fight a garrison of Philistines, my Glocks became living extensions of me. I shot, sprayed, spurted, belched and lobbed (the “ark” grenades) death from my hands. Their heads fragmented like spoilt water melons and rotten tomatoes. I was like a fox that had been released into a coop of chickens; they fled before me except their most stout hearted who paid dearly for their bravery. I was quick on the draw, it’s either that or death. In the wilderness of Judea that was how the firstborn amongst our brethren was able to defeat the prince of the fallen ones.

“Agent Rock, it does not have to come to this, we can settle our differences amicably”. There she was again, still looking so irresistible. This woman had my number and once more my guard came down and in a shot, I saw stars, and they were not those lining the Milky Way. I know an Agent of Light is allowed to fall seven times and rise again but two times in quick succession is ridiculous!

…I woke to the drip of water in a dank, dark dungeon with my hands tied behind my back.  I saw the silhouettes of four of the fallen ones. I got to know their names as Shortee, Blues, Doubtfire and Lusty, my nemesis.

The fallen ones are wily ones; if they can make you change your confession then they have one up on you. They started working on me slowly, asking me what I want, promising to spare me if I can give up the key since they could not find it where it was hidden but I stuck to my confession like a limpet to a rock.

Shortee was the meanest of them all, a well known terrorist, he is short and squat with deep scars running down his face like he had battled a couple of wounded leopards. He had body odour and a breath like the smell from the pits of “abaddon”.  Boy, the dude is ugly! His job was to bomb gold reserves, storage silos and cripple economies of the Light forces. He hated prosperity with a passion.  “ whatever your name is, give me the key and tell me you want death and I will dispatch you fast, if not I will make you feel so much pain that you would think the universe is only made up of agony”  he said, releasing rank, fetid fumes into my nostrils.

I looked at him and shouted, “Enlargement”. I was going to keep up this confession and never give up the key or die in the process. That made the guy so mad that he struck me on the face over and over with the butt of his gun. However, that did not make me waver, I remembered the first scroll of the key said to sing and I started belting out albeit hoarsely “……no limits, no boundaries, I can see increase all around me….”. That got them so riled they descended on me like locusts on a fruitful orchard but I kept singing even when my whole body was a mass of hurts and my whole voice was gone. I just kept singing!

Blues was a mean bugger, a pharmacological expert who dealt with chemicals which affected ones spirit and made you depressed. He injected some of his stuff into me, figuring if my spirit became low, I would give up more easily. However, I remembered when we were building the walls of Salem and were making no progress to the point that we all got discouraged, Capt. Nehemiah our platoon leader had told us that “the joy of Elyon was our strength”. Even though I was shivering with all that stuff in my system, I kept screaming “ENLARGEMENT” until I completely lost my voice.

Doubtfire was the dude we are most wary off, sleek and as slippery as a greased eel, his job was to steal and poison faith supplies. The Light forces lived by faith, special bread that was made from floury words from the kitchens of Elyon. So long we have our rations, we can survive anywhere but exhaust them, and survival becomes very remote even in the most conducive environment. I had stuffed myself with enough supplies in the word worlds, so Doubtfire could not affect me in any way. I kept shouting “enlargement” even when they whacked me in the mouth over and over again until it was only bubbles of blood and saliva that came out when I said “enlargement”.

Lusty sashayed towards me all radiant and brilliant (her beauty incongruous in such ugly surroundings), lifted my jaw with a finger softer than velvet and surrounded my space with her breath and fragrances that seem to waft from Eden’s best blooms. It was such a welcome relief from the terrible odour Shortee had inundated me with. In that sweet voice of hers, she asked, “are you sure you are not mistaken Rocky darling, would you not rather have entanglement instead of enlargement” and winked at me. I spat out enlargement and stained her pristine white suit that looked whiter than pure driven snow. She was enraged and slapped me viciously. “We will see about that" she said. 

I was in a tight spot and needed help desperately so with my thumb I depressed a button on my belt that triggered off “Chesed” alarm bells in the “Throne”. I passed out and came to and passed out again! The pain these guys meted out was excruciating beyond the solar system.

Suddenly there was an explosion accompanied by blinding light and the Light Forces prime agent “Jesse Christos”, appeared, right on time. He had a reputation of NEVER BEING LATE TO THE RESCUE!

While the fallen ones were stunned, he freed me and both of us in synchronized unison unleashed our wrath on the enemy. He took out three of them; I have never seen faster shooting all my life even though I was one of the best. If not for the prevailing circumstances, I would have stood and gaped unendingly. I tripped and while looking out for me, Lusty shot Him with one of their hellish submachine guns. He fell and I took the Glock from his hand and pumped a bullet into her forehead. As she died, I realized she was an illusion. She changed to her real form, wizened and old with a face more ugly than medusas with hair made of writhing serpents. I kept shooting until all their hissing was no more.

The bullets caught Agent Jesse on the head, hands, feet and side and blood gushed out like an eternal fountain. I was dying because I had lost a lot too and the faithose in my blood was almost gone. He brought out an intravenous set and infused me with the last of His blood, also gave me the last bit of loaf from His ration. I had never felt such life giving communion; He gave up His life for me, shed His blood for me.  On the battle fields of life, there is no greater love than this, that a man would lay down his life for a friend. As He died, he told me, “remember the words of Elyon, Agent, on this rock, I will build my forces and the gates of hell would not prevail against it”! I wept, broken, amazed, and stunned beyond belief!

EPILOGUE

I was on my way to Paradisia for vacation in my new cruiser “Rehoboth” (the newest in the enlargement series). As I sipped on chilled Chapman and looked into the eyes of Lillypie my wife and frolicked with Neil and Christy my children, Joy and peace suffused me. The key of revelation actually opened the doors of enlargement, even expansion into galaxies never imagined and what an experience it has been. It unlocked a chain reaction of miraculous possibilities, AD2013 what a year!

What's more, after three days in Raphas intensive care unit, Agent Jesse rose from the dead (apparently he was only unconscious when I thought he was dead) and is back to His station on the Throne.  

For the enlargement haters and slanderers, especially those that are so riled up about “Rehoboth”, all I have to say is that if you did not see my travails or my seeds, please do not envy my harvest. As I closed my eyes to nap, the words that came to mind are “……..HE THAT ENDURETH TO THE END SHALL BE SAVED”!!!!!

THE END! 
                                         © 2013 Ekpo Ezechinyere                         

AD 2013: ......ENLARGEMENT (2)

                                                                

……then they struck with such hellish fury! I was not surprised in the least because it had been written in “The Pages of Life” that opposition would surely come for the keys sake and The Pages NEVER lie! Reflexively, I uttered the war cry of the Light Forces, “THE BATTLE IS THE LORDS” in a resounding scream! The enemies came at me like a flood but since I was in spirit mode, there was an impregnable standard around my spaceship. Inundated by darkness, stygian and thick, they swarmed around me, evil hornets of destruction, their stings laced with death. I flicked on my Logos lamps and light suffused everywhere within my radius, (they hate light with every core of their dastardly beings); it was light that darkness can never comprehend nor extinguish. I could hear their agony as they screeched like tormented banshees. The ones closet to “Meditation” melted away from the heat of the light like inferior margarine.

Their battleships were serpentine and black with venomous missiles that came hissing at me with vicious intent. However, the last scroll of the key of revelation sprung up in the sea of my mind like a lifebuoy. I keyed in IS5417 into my dashboard and my ship developed an outer layer that no weapon forged in their malevolent smiths could penetrate but the buggers did not know that. The import of the key was beginning to dawn on me, also the reason why “Sam Seer” was so crazy about it.

All the lessons in the Temple Training Centre started coming alive. I remembered the course 2Cor104, where grandmaster Paul revealed that the weapons the Light Forces use in warfare are not man-made but divine in their functioning. Remembering this, I went on rampage!

I had studied to show myself approved in the classes of The Rabbi to ensure that I would not be ashamed in situations like this. Now all those teachings and trainings came to bear as I wove, dove, spun, darted and floated like a heavenly bee between the battles ships of the fallen ones. I fired my “Skabash Ghost missiles” into their midst and wreaked havoc. They had tried but could never understand the workings of these armaments. It remained a mystery to them, causing confusion and when they thought it was going one way, it went the other. They were especially good for long target shooting.

Their ships were ugly, nasty, humongous things, goliaths filled with rage and wrath but I shot them down with the “sling of David” rockets. When they came in companies of fifties, I activated Elijah’s incendiaries, which were like napalm infused Molotov cocktails thrown from fire producing satellites situated in outer space. These consumed objects fed to their cameras by my vessel. When they came in congregated swarms of thousands, I sprayed the “Jaw-ass” guns and scattered them (these firearms use the know-how Samson deployed to dispatch a thousand elite philistine soldiers using the jaw bone of an ass). They came at me in one way and scattered in seven. I was having a ball; they were like bread to me.

Next I released the supersonic singers which work by generating whirlwinds from the heavenlies that make enemy battleships ram into one another. Jehoshaphat King taught us this well; he discovered how the mechanics of this machinery sets up an ambush against wicked opponents.

For invincibility, I triggered off my blood bombs, the smoky bloody screen emitted from them made the fiery darts of my enemies to pass over me. They could not see me! I was sitting pretty!

……..hey, wait a minute! “What is that ship I see amongst my foes”? It was snowy white, translucent with gold lined wings and different from all the ships around. It also had no guns meaning it was more likely a friend but something was not quite right because it was not been shot at by the fallen ones. I defused my external shield so that I could get a closer look and through its transparent perspex, I saw the most beautiful woman ever. She was so fair that the sun beaten into dark submission had to hide for her ambiance to permeate the world. She was decked in a white armoured spandex which filled in and filled out in all the right places. What Adam felt when he saw Eve became more than a story to me. I was transfixed like a deer caught in the harsh glare of her lamps, a butterfly drunk and giddy from the nectar of her looks. The lessons of 2TIM24 that a soldier does not get himself involved in civilian affairs were pretty distant in my mind now like a long lost world.

The words “Agent Rock, it is all over” came through my intercom in a voice sweeter than all the honeycombs on planet Beerium. I knew I had been had but before I could react, the contraption on her chest shot the buxomy laser at me. I had heard about this instrument of war but had never experienced it. In the word worlds, you never lose concentration! YOU MUST REMAIN SOBER AND VIGILANT!!! The laser went right through my force field and Kevlar and struck my heart. Waves of pain washed over me and before I could call upon the name of Elyon’s Son, the “fallen ones” took pot shots at me.

One of the shots hit the core of “Meditation” and we careened out of control. The last thing I heard as we crashed was the tortured shriek of tearing metal then the whole world went black………….

TO BE CONTINUED…………………………………..
                                         
                                         © 2013 Ekpo Ezechinyere

AD 2013: .....ENLARGEMENT (1)

AD 2013: During the celebration on the eve of yearly shifts, The Commander of the DCC Light Forces “Sam Seer” proclaimed that “The Elyon” had declared a dispensation of Enlargement for the destinies of Zionites to enable them take territories and resettle abandoned intergalactic terrains. Thing was the “key of revelation” from the city of Isaiah was needed to make this prophecy a reality.

The good news made ripples of joy spread through our ranks like late summer wind through a field of ripened golden wheat. After all the struggles of yester-years, it was finally harvest season! However any agent of Light worth his salt knew that it was going to involve some good fight. The city of Isaiah was 4000 years in the past and we had to bring the key to the present to unlock the divination. Furthermore the “Fallen ones” were going to fight tooth and nail to frustrate our efforts. They were going to try to steal, kill and destroy, their sole mission of existing. Those guys are MEAN!

I needed to be in top form for the battles ahead so I headed to the Temple Training Center (TTC) which housed our training facilities. As I crossed the floor towards my destination, "The Gym of Supplication", I kept looking at the full length painting of Elijah, the greatest athlete that ever passed through this way. He was said to have been so fit, he could lift the “rain weights” (these were the Temples heaviest ever and the man lifted these back breaking masses for three years at a stretch without baulking). I wondered whether I could ever become like him with a sigh.  Sgt. Mantis was already waiting for me, this Instructor believes in going at it turbo charged without ever ceasing and since I could not keep up, I had to engage the help of Parakletos, the oldest guide in the temple. He was the gentlest being you could ever encounter, older than the hills and sprightlier than the fittest and youngest agent. Especially good at helping us through angles never imagined, more so when we grew so weak. However, when this old dude got his groove on during His bench- presses, He could make one utter such aching groans that can be heard all the way from here to the ends of the universe.

Next, I spent considerable time in the “Hall of Mirrors” to see myself the way I really am and how I could be. The reflections here help you see into the soul of The Elyon. The astonishing thing is that as we gaze into His reflections, glorious transformation takes place, making that of a caterpillar to a butterfly or an ugly duckling to a swan seems so ordinary. Ultimately, we end up becoming like Him.

D-DAY! Clothed in the best gear designed in our celestial armoury, I was ready. Kevlar suit and force field intact with belt that had more gadgets than the Batman’s ( the people who will contend with me make Gotham city seem like a saints filled Church and The Joker like a smiling, sane, Santa). My Glocks were loaded with bullets infused with the blood of The rare, spotless Lamb, the finest of our bio-technological weaponry (I heard that in the history of human warfare, nothing has ever existed like it). These were bullets that even the Prince of the fallen ones had no answers to.  I could not wait to pump some into those suckers and see the agony in the black pools of their soulless eyes as they disintegrate. I was battle ready, a walking arsenal eager to unleash destruction on the armies of hell.

To get to Isaiah, I was transported by the DCC shuttle “Philip’s Chariot” (this shuttle was a cross between the one that took Philip from the Gaza desert to Azotus and Elijah beyond the reach of gravity, these men were two of our earliest grandmasters) to “The spirit conveyor terminal”, where my spaceship “MEDITATION” was idling quietly. I entered and transmuted from physical to spiritual, when traveling to the word worlds you need to be in “spirit mode”. 

The Word worlds are built with letters which in the spirit mode, become fleshly, real and alive otherwise the voyage becomes meaningless and a wild goose chase ensues. The “Fallen ones” try to ensure Zionites revert to their physical state here which makes the letters from which the cities are built become flying razors that kill. This is why our catch phrase when we take our trips to these lands is “Spirit Reigns Supreme”!

In a shot I landed in Isaiah, the metropolis was named after its architect (a man who enlisted the help of Seraphs in the construction of the city) and consists of 66 counties. The land was full of visions, revelations and such poetic symmetry that I was lost in rapturous wonder. I quickly broke out of my reverie albeit reluctantly but this trip was for business and not pleasure. The buildings were made in the form of bank vaults where different keys were hidden.  My boots were designed with transducers that were tuned in to the frequency of Lordly satellites situated beyond outer space. This enabled my steps to be ordered. Without much ado,  I found myself in precinct 54, where I used my master key “Abba” to unlock the vault. Abba can virtually unlock anything there is.

It was astonishing to see that the keys were 17 pages of scrolls bound together. They looked so ancient and fragile that I feared touching them would make them come apart but on contact, I found out that they were stronger than “Wolverine’s” Adamantium skeleton, eternally durable. Gazing at these scrolls brings on a discovery that everywhere is in darkness even when you are inundated with halogen lamps. The key emitted light that flooded one’s path and showed glorious riches beyond anything that was in Aladdin’s cave.  They gave a disclosure that was beyond the comprehension of flesh and blood. I hid them in the special hart’s pouch beneath my breast under my Kevlar suit.

Elated at my find like he that had found great spoil, I knew it was time to go. I got back into Meditation and no sooner had I got my engines running than they struck with such hellish fury………………………….

TO BE CONTINUED…………………………………..
                                  
                                          © 2013 Ekpo Ezechinyere

2013: WAR IN THE HEAVENLIES......

                                                      

                                                                         

JAHDIEL:
The clang of clashing steel rent the heavens as Satriel and the minion went at it. Surprisingly the minion was taking the fight to him and on hearing the trumpet of my comrade, I knew I had to join the fray. Sulphurous fumes choked me as I got entwined in the battle and no sooner had I joined than I started losing ground myself. Something was definitely wrong. Naturally, the minion was not in my league and should have capitulated long before now. It should have been a higher prince in their dark ranks that would have fought with such skill, certainly not him. I had to get that scroll of promise from his hand or a lot would be lost right from the very beginning. Something made me look downwards and immediately I saw what and where the problem was.

Kemi had not let go of the past! A cloud of depression still hung over her. Her break up with Femi and the job she lost were still so much on her mind. Even though the word had gone forth that God was doing a new thing in this new dispensation, she clung to the pain of the past like a drowning man clings to a life line. She still swam in the ocean of her hurt, coloring the canvas of a new year with the brush and oils of the old. The atmosphere she had created around her was too melancholic for heaven’s intervention (The Elohim inhabits the praises of his people). We ministers to the Heirs of salvation need the medium of jubilation and celebration to carry out our celestial duties. Even though our mandate was to bring the words of Elohim to pass in her circumstances, we were hamstrung by her attitude. The scroll in the minion’s hand was the title deed to the promise of enlargement that was hers but we could not retrieve it due to her gloomy feelings. When would the blood washed earthlings realize that they determine to a large extent what happens in the heavens by their outlook?

Terror raced through me, as I saw another minion slobbering and jabbering over her head. It was “Suicide” and he was staking claim on her mind through the door of all that dank mood of depression. Suicide loves depression, the way the teenage mutant ninja turtles love pizza. He feeds fat on it. This situation was getting critical. My ward was creating a path to join us way earlier than had been written into her destiny from the foundation of the world. Something had to happen fast! I had to get the scroll but my hands were tied, my wings had been clipped. Without the words of the promise, all was lost.

The minion had made short work of Satriel and now came at me with all the fury of hell. Slashing, thrusting, parrying, cutting, he unleashed a torrent of blows at me to the last inch of my life. It was all I could do not to capitulate. The last blow was meant to decapitate me and I blocked with every bit of might I possessed. My head was saved but the force ripped the sword from my grip. The cocky grin on his ugly mug dared me; his smile said it was all over…..

KEMI:
The prophetic word had gone forth that this was my “year of enlargement” but I had heard all that before. Last year, it was “Word and wonders’ and all I received were harsh words that destroyed my esteem and wondrous heart break. Before then it was “Transfer by favour” which was true because my favor at work was transferred to another and I lost my job. I am surprised at how cynical and sarcastic I have become considering the fact that I used to be pretty gay. I am even so shocked at myself that these days I even entertain the thoughts of suicide. I find myself browsing suicide sites on the web, all that stuff about guarding your heart with all diligence had become hogwash to me. I know I have opened up myself to the prince of darkness but right now, I am past caring. What would be will be (que sera, sera). Truth is sometimes I feel someone praying for me even though I have left the prayer unit of my church for a while now. Even my presence in church these days is more out of religion than communion. I have become a sad, miserable case. Anyway I started it all by giving my heart to an irreverent soul because he was so good looking and rich coupled with the fact that I was approaching 38. But even though it was my fault, I still laid the blame on God’s laps. He should have been able to avert all these, but the scriptures that say a man seeks out his ways, and then rails against Him kept darting through the muddy waters of my heart like a mudskipper.

It was 3am and the telly was blaring. That is the only way I get to sleep these day. The TV has be on to give a feeling of companionship. It helps me to combat the feeling of loneliness but it does not help my sleep much. Through the haze of lexotan induced sleep (that He gives his beloved sleep stopped applying to me months ago), the voice of some televangelist came cutting through “He has loved us with an everlasting love”. For some reason, those words were like the hint of spring following a harsh winter. It stirred something within my soul, awakened a feeling that was long dead. A long capped well opened within me and out of it gushed living water like I had never experienced. Joy and faith surged like the rising Nile. I knelt by my bed and wept while asking for forgiveness. I prayed and worshipped. I sang and praised and I wept some more………

It was like a fist of cloud quickly blossomed into giant mushrooms of divine cumulus nimbus clouds that poured forth healing rain. Rains that filled the dry wells of my spirit and as I remembered that the prophetic mandate was for us to sing this year, gallons upon gallons of praise were lifted to water my dry altar. Fire whooshed down like it happened between Elijah and the prophets of baal in the Old Testament. I sang like a thrush that had escaped the shackles of a harsh and debilitating winter. I sang like a nightingale that has scorned the buffeting winds that ripped away its feathers. “Great is Your faithfulness”, “Great is Your mercy towards me”, the praise poured forth like rich wine, each cupful meant for the worship buds of my King. I sang and sang and sang……

JAHDIEL:
Inexplicably, my weakness disappeared and with the speed of lightening I flew after and caught my falling sword. The minion was in trouble and he knew it as a confused look suffused his face. We both looked downwards and saw what was happening. That was the last look he ever took. Some of his higher princes appeared but since I was in my element, they did not have a prayer (that is if they could ever pray, I chuckled to myself….). They came at me in hordes and I harvested their heads like a husband man putting the sickle to harvest. It had being written that the gates of hell will never prevail against the Lamb’s chosen ones. When the others heard the flap of Michael’s heavy wings, they all took flight. I picked up Kemi’s scrolled title deed and felt so good. I was delighted within for her because I was going to ensure every promise was performed in her life, my job was to make good the pledges of the Elohim to her. 2013, a spring of possibilities and enlargement…………

As I flew down to start off my urgent assignment, top priority was to extirpate “Suicide” (he escaped my wrath once and caused great havoc, this time he will not I determined resolutely); I heard the words that the Elohim spoke to Jacob’s children years ago through Isaiah in the 54th chapter of his manuscript…. Sing……Enlarge the place of your tent and let the curtains of your habitation be stretched out: spare not: lengthen your cords and strengthen your stakes. For you will spread abroad to the right hand and left……..”

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

                                         
                                                                                                                          © 2013 Ekpo Ezechinyere