THE TRUE MEANING OF LIFE

(A collection of poems)
By
KENNETH OODEE

© Kenneth Oodee (2023)

 Acknowledgement

My irst debt is to God almighty, for His Grace, wisdom,

and knowledge in accomplishing this great work of art.
Justice Korobe, a civil engineer, and a writer, also has my
gratitude for his tireless and motivational support despite
his busy schedules.
Table of Contents

1. The True Meaning Of Life .................................................. 4

2. Life at best is very brief ........................................................ 6

3. Meditation I............................................................................... 7

4. Meditation II ............................................................................. 9

5. Anti-Clockwise ...................................................................... 12

6. The Unfair Bargain .............................................................. 13

7. Life & Death ............................................................................ 15

8. Body, Spirit & Soul .............................................................. 17

9. Running Time ........................................................................ 19

10. The Forbidden Fruit ............................................................ 20

11. The Human Race .................................................................. 22

12. A Beautiful Tragedy ............................................................ 24

13. Evening Falls .......................................................................... 25

14. Purpose Is Born ..................................................................... 27

15. Liquid Grave I ........................................................................ 28

16. Liquid Grave II ...................................................................... 29

THE TRUE MEANING OF LIFE

The years go on and on and on

Carrying the months with light from the sun
To begin a new ending
Its days and time we're no longer redeeming
Sadness and moments of regret comes in turns
Gladly, sometimes joy and happiness also hums
Some people we look up to, are below the earth
Some we underestimate are above the heavens
Loved ones and enemies have come and gone
With memories in our heads echoing like a gong

Everything rushes to end in a new beginning

But the world in laziness, never stops spinning
Accustomed to this tireless rhythm
Where we follow the pattern of the talking drum
Living our life in the season of happenstance
As we stamp our feet in the attire of cultural dance
The struggle has become a tradition
With every step justifying our religion
Faith mixed with doubt in the pursue of fate
The clock becomes an enemy, for in punctuality we're late

Our paths lacks coal tile

We begin and end our lives in iles
Dry season triggering wet tears
Raining season creeping dry fears
Driving in this old lorry of life
Where solitude is a noisy wife
4
Nagging our holiday of rest
Spending our days existing rather than living
Now our old age drowns in vanity
To the past, the future is a penalty

The days old more plaques than the Egyptians

Scars on the pages of our skin like an inscription
Experience have become a shelter
With hopes making the surrounding better
Worries feed me each day
The night never seems to go away
I'm drunk with words
Ironically, with silence I build my walls
Reward or karma, one must surpass the measure of my time
For in inding the true meaning of life, I judge my rhyme.

5
LIFE AT BEST IS VERY BRIEF

"Life at best is very brief" they say

A painful reality we live in, I say
Borrowed hours and moments
Debtors from birth till death

The green leaves rusts with time

Even predators, have their inish line
From childhood of smiles and dimples
To youthful beauty that drowns in wrinkles

From youthful catwalks and gifts of roses

To old age of limping and gifts of glasses
From sweet beginning of love and promises
That ends in malice or friendship and reminisce

We live in time yet have no time

It scares me how everything is temporary.

6
MEDITATION I

Time is a traveler
Yet it takes no road
As we journey yonder,
Let our roads be unknown
Neither should our ways be crooked
What is mysterious, cannot be understood
What is not understood, cannot be destroyed
For humans are poison
They destroy everything they touch
Still, hate no one

Only their ways

Love all
Befriend none
For friendship breeds commitment
Commitment breeds trust
Trust breeds destruction
The beauty of life is love
The beauty of love is life
Let not their ways change you
Cause every road has its own judgement

Let your conscience be your Judge

Listen to the song from the birds
Let their music entertain you
Cause there's no melody in violence
Let your eyes see the past ahead
And know which way to go
7
For in experience, we better our ways
Borrow an extra ear if need be
For in counsel, we better our days
We came naked, and naked shall we go

This is the only fashion of life

Sun and the moon are life's photographers
Do not let them capture your fears
Neither let them capture your sins
Live your life and love your life
Cherish the uniqueness of your diverse being
And in reference, applaud your maker
Be conscious of your existence
Let no fantasy steal your reality
Neither let the nightmares still your dreams

Cause everything too is an illusion

So, gather all you can
Let go of burdens
For worries delay our date with destiny
In regrets and agony, do we drown the true meaning of life.

8
MEDITATION II

I sat alone in a lonely hour

Eyes ixed on nothing
Lips sealed as my thought drips
This is my meditation

As life goes in circles,

Let our actions be straight forward
Live spent on worries and trouble
Victory and defeat make us proud or humble
Our wisdom separates us
Our ignorance isolates us
When we're offered pain and anger as fashion
Let hope and peace remain our out it

Guide your path with precautions

As the mind attracts,
So does the heart rejects
And when the mind rejects
The heart attracts
For when both is conquered
We live but we're not alive
We live but forget our role

For time judges itself

Everything we've lost, inds its way back to us
Everything we've damaged, takes more from us
Truth is a map
Life is a journey
We can decide not to travel
But we'll sure meet our end
Fear is darkness
9
A little light bloom’s our ego
The past is dead
Even tomorrow is not alive
The present is a survivor
In it hopes and riches lies
Everything in accordance
Breeds rest of mind in abundance
Grow life inside of you

Let your existence spread

Let your footprint heal the lame
Time makes us patient
Time makes us desperate
Time is a healer
Time also is a killer
Nothing good is bad
Anything bad is bad

As consciousness comes from meditation

So does knowledge come from realization
When everything is lost, and one thing is gained
One thing is lost, and everything is gained
Let patient and contentment be balanced
Let gratitude and humility be adorned
Be addicted to truth
For it's never enough

As the moon travels

So does our days
When revenge knocks
Let's not rush to the door
10
Let's stay ixed in our room
For in it sometimes lies our doom
The more we live
The humbler we should be

For what you possess has been possessed

And what you crave, has been neglected
Continuous practice doesn't make perfect
But continuous practice with passion
The season we see shall be no more
Make hay while the sunshine
Make hay after the sun shines
For success comes with no resting time

Do not conspire to destroy

Neither be quite nor watch evil
That too is witchcraft
As we grow, still one thing marvels me
Nothing is new,
Yet life is full of surprises
Everything is nothing
So let nothing be your god

I sat alone in a lonely hour

Eyes ixed on nothing
Lips sealed as my thought’s drips
This is my meditation.

11
ANTI-CLOCKWISE

The earth is wearied

Of generations after generations
My heart is worried
Of sour celebrations
For the soul is destroyed
The body is glori ied
The strong fears death
The weak is constantly set
Children gamble their cards in turns
Fifty- ifty, they cast the dice

One day out of time,

There's no more Sunday
We skip for exercise,
And skip our days
Every day is the same
Let's just play ignorance to their names
The wheel of life is always in motion
Our speed and journey, we auction
A journey of thousand miles
We're nighty nine steps ahead

A new day, as the old lorry sets its engine

Travelling to the past, becomes a future goal
Sometimes paradox plays a deceiving role
Even when the cock crows,
We tend to forget our reminder
Sometimes failure lies in the effort
The stairs get higher, the more we climb
Illusion becomes real, in a twinkle if an eye
For this kind of choice,
Destruction is the price.

12
THE UNFAIR BARGAIN
We can't say no to death
It's the only game we don't bet
Everyone must go
though the grave is not the goal
It's part of the mission
Though eternity lies the vision
Body rotted
Soul revitalized
Mind forgotten
Heart remembered

On the grave side,

Words are muttered
Songs of immortality
Echoes through the tunnel of eternity
Left on the earth are footprints
Left in our lives, are ingerprints
Sailing to forever
The wild wind is a constant reminder
Thousands of ships we can't see
Floating on the high sea

Lying in a box less half a home

Compulsory humility to some
Caged from the womb
Still caged down the tomb
The world is a prison to buy and sell
We only trade fairly, then returned to our cell
In turns we exit
In dreams we exist
Laugh to the peak
Cause you'll be wiped for
13
For it is a curse
To see the beginning of life
And not the end of it
The footsteps we leave,
Are being traced to were we'll be
It doesn't matter where we're laid
For we all have a resting home.

14
LIFE & DEATH

Life and death,

Oldest friends without love
The beauty of one, lies in the other
The tragedy of one, lies in the other
What one takes
The other gives
What one gives,
The other takes
Where there's death, there's life
Where there's life, there's death

One cannot exist without the other

They were made together
But are not the same
Death is for life and life for death
The birth of death is life
The death of life is birth
Both have one thing in common
A rebirth
We mistake life for a better one
In ignorance, condemn death

Sometimes life is a killer

Sometimes death is a healer
They separate the world
Also, they unite the world
They destroy
Also, they build
They're both protagonist and antagonist
Yet none takes the lead role
They are inferior in superiority
They are superior in inferiority
15
A fair supremacy of hierarchy
In living, we understand death
In death, do we clearly understand life
In this our conscious reality,
We embrace this warm thought
As we place judgement on our deeds
By looking at the things we don't see
And listening to the voices we don't hear `
The words of our forefathers
Echoing through the tunnels of eternity

Lingering in the ears of generations

Their legacies, benchmark for survival
Their footprints, landmark of correction
Their souls have become ancestors to life
Where death ends, life begins
Where life ends, death begins
Cause both can never be conquered
In between life and death do we lay
Amongst these losses and gain,
Do we understand the true meaning of life itself.

16
BODY, SPIRIT & SOUL

For the body, spirit and soul came together

In a fair unity of disagreement
That the body is pleasure
The spirit is nature
The soul is the treasure
Body lies in confusion
Spirit Awakens in correction
Soul, a destruction, or redemption
The body owns the world
The soul owns eternity

The spirit lies between

For when one is on shift,
The other is at work
The third is constant
One bears the light
One shines bright
The other bears the burden
Body decays,
Spirit attends the funeral
Soul weeps

In daylight, one is darkened

In darkness, one is brightened
In between, the other lay
The true meaning of existence, lies in all
Yet the failure of survival, lies in one
Time judges one
The other Judges time
The third is time itself
One is faith
One is hope
17
One is fate
One is earth,
One is heaven
The other is heaven and hell.

18
RUNNING TIME

The cheetah runs the fastest

No doubts, time is still the best

Everything is wrongly moving fast

Future now lies behind the past

Weather losing track of its forecast

Rainbow colours, similar contrast

To Suicide, our hearts we've cast

In our thoughts, we become outcasts

In the evening comes our breakfast

To arti icial creations, we steadfast

No more honour to irst things

We need more hours in a haste

Lost loving to lust

Lost memories to dust.

19
THE FORBIDDEN FRUIT

Cloud darkened by thunderstorms

Upon nature, her anger formed
The atmosphere came together
In pleasure, the world became wet
Mighty drops of rain hit the roof,
Then strolls down to the window
Windows covered with ine linen
As cold spreads in the dwelling
Eden was beautifully dressed
Eve was beautifully undressed
Eyes ixed in eyes
Hands locked in hands

Lips locked in lips

Breathe made warm the cold
Breathe seized by the moment
Left to right the fruit dangles
Salivation couldn't digest the urge
Heat strolls down and hits the nipples
Tongue perched like lies
Taste of honey rather than sweat
The tree of life
As both branches were spread
A warm meal served cold
Beautiful as it seems

20
Righteousness became a sin
Blood on the dance loor,
Perfection is lawed
Hunger for death
Satisfaction of life
A healthy fruit for a dying stomach
An angelic bit
A demonic lavour
Then cums the devil
There goes eve
The fruit was seen by sin
And we became blind for seeing.

21
THE HUMAN RACE

The human race is in danger

At home, we're all strangers
That we do not choose
What to be or what to refuse
We forget in remembrance
In emergency, we hate the ambulance
We're living to die
We're dying to live
The catastrophe is amusing
Women have hate, to gossip

The Barton now belongs to men

Time has failed to judge
The Barton now belongs to humans
Children are now adults
As elders forgets their roles
Devil has become a god
As false prophets neglect their souls
Our hearts are stoned
Our minds drowning in liquid
Believe me in reality or illusion

That we no longer see a sky

The cloud has taken ownership
The moon no longer spotlights
Crime is now our stage light
Shooting stars have been shot
In funerals, we live our days
In laughter the dead cries
In tears, the living jubilates
The alarm has been employed
The cock has lost its job
22
The birds no longer sings,
The mosquitoes raps along
We work to breakdown
A twenty irst century slavery
We love to break hearts
A twenty irst century bravery
The time is upside down
Our ways are cruci ied
We run to destruction
For in pain lies our joy.

23
A BEAUTIFUL TRAGEDY

The past echoes in baritone

Current time have gone sour
The bitterness of our existence,
Drooling over our daily dealings
Struggling to smile

The excessive waste of emotions

Nothing counts, except the coins
Praying to God, still we idolize currencies
The betrayal of self con idence
Taking us back to our vomit

Growing in foolishness
As we run from our childhood of wisdom
Where everything is done from the heart
With a little common sense to balance out morals
Youthfulness, a gambling stage of life

We either sell our souls

Or buy a permanent scar
We become lost
Then we're found in nothingness
In pain do we lose the true meaning of life.

24
EVENING FALLS

Evening falls on day light

One last candle to keep the night
leaves dropping,
longing for the ground
Settling on its root
No place like home, a fair truth
Memories in the air
Life in its lair

Memories buried in the future

Death is only a seed to nurture
Colours fading in time
Beauty decayed in rhyme
A downfall of resurrection
calmness glued with tension
The stars came together
But scattered in brightness

Seduction quietly lay

In between Cold and breeze
From the ashes of rust,
Hope was born
With mere nakedness,
Stems were clothed
A joyful mourning,
A mournful celebration

25
Nature has died in life
life is constantly alive in death
Night mixed with dawn
As moon embraces the sun.

26
PURPOSE IS BORN

Salvation in belief
Fate and talent drowns in believe

We make our plans,

But life decides

The journey of life is beyond coal tile

As each height waved from miles

We grow in hate, we grow in love

Regret and reward applauds as time evolves

Footprints becomes landmark to generations

Generations of pain mixed with culture

We fail, we law, we realize

The true essence of life

In a bittersweet remembrance,
Purpose is born.

27
LIQUID GRAVE I

Love veri ied by acceptance

No compulsion nor resistance
Believing is the only believe
Transformation to conceive

Conscious blindness of the earth

Eternal redemption is a depth
Struggles and pain to breath
When the pain and gain is death

Physical spiritualism
Conscious realism
Your fears becomes’ afraid
All because you've obeyed

Your tomb is empty yet your dead

Turns a ghost yet no one is scared
You become a spirit
That never lived in a casket

Nothing is ageless
Yet your eternity is timeless
Not all the dead will die
Not all the living will live

28
LIQUID GRAVE II

And from the liquid grave

Death died in solitude grieve
No tears to lood the wet rivers
Nor sins to quilt the poor sinner

For death has done it worst

On the price list, so much it cost
That mere mortals can't afford
Tears billed from the lord

Beautiful laws from the gutter

Echoes of ode from the mocker
Wounds are healed
Eternity, we feel

Weep not your tears

But cry out your laugh
From the mountains
To the forest

From the land

To the seas
It doesn't matter where we're laid
For we all have a home.

29