By Majekodunmi Oseriemen Ebhohon

They sold baby goat for ten naira,

mother goat for thirty.

My clever friend

chose the cheaper one.

“Ah! Ten naira is a steal,” he said,

“Why pay for old meat?”

But today,

he has spent ninety naira

in three-naira bits

across thirty days,

feeding this tiny bleating thief

and still,

no milk,

no meat,

no pregnancy,

no promise!

When will this thing

even grow hips?

When will it chase a he-goat?

Abi this curse is a monk?

I told him:

“The one who avoids the mother’s price

pays the child’s hunger in days.”

He now feeds disappointment,

whose bleats wouldn’t spare his sleeps.