Her story

Under the starless sky she lay
Seeking a peace that’s yet to come her way
She tries to be one with nature
And yet the owl is her only sister 
What’s this yearning she so desperately craves 
Her subconscious is a total rave 
Rules and laws try’s to control her with fuss 
But her rebel heart shows who’s boss
She sits uncertain about tomorrow 
And hides behind a smile her pain and sorrow
Don’t get fooled by her fake smile and laughter 

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What’s behind the facade is all that truly matter 
She tries to fill the void within
But she’s way too deep to let it in
The cuts are but a physical reminder 
While she lays on the bed and begin to ponder 
The whispers and rumors they throw at her 
Hurts more deeply than she dares to care 
She questions her inconsequential existence 
And her logic opposes her true essence
She refuses to accept what’s going on
And thus sinks deeper into oblivion 
There is nothing let but an empty shell
The peace she once sought is now null 

A Story Inspired by the Poem — “Behind Her Smile”

In a Surulere neighborhood of Lagos, in a busy street, there was a young woman named Adaora. To everyone outside, she was the party life — the girl with the infectious laughter, the sharp humor, the one who wore the brightest colors. Her neighbors would say, “That Ada girl, she no dey ever get problem!” But behind the closed door of her tiny flat, a different scene was played out.

Each night, Adaora would lie on her bed and stare at the ceiling, trying to put into perspective the chaos in her head. The churning of her thoughts was more deafening than the sound of the generator outside. Her room, with only the soft light filtering through, was her world — a quiet place where she could finally shed her disguise. She wasn’t okay. She hadn’t been in ages.

She tried to connect to the world outside — heard birds in the morning, felt rain caress her skin, and watched the moon disappear into Lagos smoke at night. But the only constant friend she had was the owl on her window at 3 a.m., like a quiet witness to her collapse.

Her Insta posts, her joke-filled tweets, and her laboriously filtered WhatsApp posts were seen by the audience and they assumed she was successful. But there wasn’t any of them to realize how quietly she cried into her pillow, drowning in water that no one knew was there. No one saw the scars — the ones on her body, of course, but the ones on her mind too.

The pressure was great: be a responsible daughter, be the smart one, don’t embarrass the family, marry up, pray harder. But Adaora was tired. Tired of pretending. Tired of the pressure. Tired of the judgments that she overheard from relatives who couldn’t understand her quiet days. “She’s lazy,” they’d tell her. “She has no ambition.”.

She’d stand in front of the mirror and wonder: Is something wrong with me? Why do I feel like I’m here, but I’m not really living?

Yet, even in this darkness, something small held her — maybe not hope, but curiosity. A question that refused to leave her alone: What if it gets better? That one question made her get out of bed one morning and send a voice note to her old friend from school. She didn’t say much. Just: “Hey… I’m not really okay.”

That one voice note turned into a long phone call. The phone call turned into a visit. The visit led to therapy. And slowly but surely, Adaora began realizing that she wasn’t broken — she was just overwhelmed, unheard, and misunderstood.

This poem is her tale and the tale of so many others. In Nigeria’s type of society where battles of the emotions are swept under the carpet or “spiritual warfare” as it is popularly known, there are way too many Adaoras walking about with battered hearts and fake smiles.

If you are reading this and it all sounds so familiar, remember this: behind every stammered laugh may be a silent cry for help. And sometimes, the bravest thing you can do — like Adaora — is to just whisper, “I’m not okay.”