ProsebySteph

"Take It."

Take it.

Take this little sweetness before the world teaches your tongue the bitter language of survival.

Take it— before your hands, still soft with innocence, become maps of cracked palms that have harvested dreams for people who have never known hunger.

You stretch your arm like a bridge built from hope, offering candy... while life quietly sharpens its knife behind your back.

Your eyes...

Your eyes are too loud.

They scream questions your lips have never learned to pronounce.

"Will tomorrow remember my name?" "Will my stomach ever stop negotiating with emptiness?" "Will my childhood outlive my body?"

Your eyes are libraries filled with books that poverty keeps burning one page at a time.

You smile...

No.

You almost smile.

Like the sun trying to break through a sky addicted to storms.

You are young, yet your forehead already carries wrinkles borrowed from generations who inherited pain like family heirlooms.

Some children inherit houses.

You inherited dust.

Some inherit legacies.

You inherited resilience.

You stand barefoot, not because the earth is your playground, but because even the ground knows your name too well.

And still...

You offer sweetness.

What irony.

A child with so little still finds something to give.

Meanwhile, there are men in polished shoes, with pockets full of plenty, whose hands have forgotten the shape of generosity.

Perhaps...

Perhaps poverty is not an empty stomach.

Perhaps poverty is a full heart that has forgotten how to feel.

Because this child, this little warrior, owns almost nothing, yet possesses the rarest currency on earth:

The willingness to share.

His kindness is louder than our wealth.

His silence is heavier than our speeches.

His stare holds more truth than a thousand podiums filled with promises.

So don't pity him.

Pity the world that taught him hardship before handwriting.

Pity the system that traded his toys for survival.

Pity us

because while he stretches out a lollipop...

he unknowingly stretches out a mirror.

And in that mirror, it is not the child we see.

It is ourselves.

Half-fed on comfort.

Starving for compassion.

The First Home

Before I learned your name,
I learned your heartbeat.
Before I saw your face,
love had already taken a seat.

This is not just a picture.
This is time... holding its breath.
A mother smiles into tomorrow,
while a father whispers life through every touch that's left.

One hand holds the camera,
one hand holds creation.
One captures a memory,
the other guards a generation.

Can you hear it?

The silent conversation... Between skin and soul, Between hope and home.

"I haven't met you... But I've loved you all along."

See, The world keeps shouting, But this womb keeps singing. The world keeps breaking, Yet this family keeps believing.

Every stretch mark... A scripture. Every heartbeat... A hymn. Every kick... A reminder That miracles don't always walk in, Sometimes... they swim.

This child has no mansion, No medals, No money to claim. Yet already possesses The richest inheritance: Two hearts Calling one name.

The camera freezes a second, But love... Love refuses to stand still. It grows with every sunrise, It climbs every hill.

So when life asks Where heaven first kissed the earth, Don't point to the clouds.

Point... To a mother's womb.

To a father's hand.

To the place where faith became flesh, Where hope found a heartbeat, And forever... Began.

Because every great story Starts before the first cry.

It begins... With love saying,

"We're waiting for you."

She stitched her smile
with trembling fingers
threading silence through skin
like pain was fashion,
like survival was something pretty
people could hang on a wall and admire.

A queen with no face.
A crown with no peace.
A body still breathing
while the soul fights to leave.

Look closely—
those ropes across her mouth
ain’t decoration.
They are all the times she swallowed thunder
because the world said,
“Good girls don’t erupt.”

So she swallowed storms.
Swallowed disrespect.
Swallowed heartbreak until her ribs became prison bars
for a spirit too loud to stay trapped.

And that blade at her neck?
That ain’t death.
That’s pressure.
Sharp.
Constant.
The kind that whispers,
“If you move wrong, you lose yourself.”

But she still lifts her chin.

Do you see it?

The elegance in exhaustion.
The holiness in holding yourself together
when every memory is pulling you apart
strand by strand.

Because sometimes strength
doesn’t roar.
Sometimes strength is a woman
staring grief in the eyes
while sewing her own shattered reflection
back into place.

And the hand with the razor—
maybe that’s society.
Maybe that’s trauma.
Maybe that’s the version of herself
she had to kill
just to survive another morning.

People love healed people.
But nobody talks about the stitching.

Nobody talks about
the nights where mirrors feel like enemies,
where confidence is just makeup
on top of bruised memories,
where crowns feel heavy
because royalty is lonely
when your heart is bleeding quietly.

She is art because she suffered.
And isn’t that tragic?

That the world claps loudest
for broken people who know how to pose beautifully.

But listen—
underneath those ropes,
behind that stitched-up sorrow,
there is still breath.
Still fire.
Still a pulse refusing permission to quit.

And maybe healing
is not becoming whole again.

Maybe healing
is learning that even cracked voices
can sing.

Maybe healing
is touching every wound gently
instead of hiding it in gold.

Maybe healing
is finally dropping the mask
and discovering
the face beneath it
was worthy of love
all along.

“Play, Even When It Hurts”

They don’t see the weight in your fingers,
How every string you touch still stings.
They just hear music.
They don’t hear the things it brings.

You play like pain is a language,
Like sorrow has a sound.
Like every note you pull from wood
Is something you once found…
Buried.
Broken.
Background.

Your eyes close — not for show,
But because you’ve been places they don’t know.
Places where hunger hums low,
Where dreams move slow,
Where hope feels like a shadow.

Yet here you stand —
Bow in hand,
Turning struggle into symphony.
Turning survival into harmony.

Multiple hands holding you steady —
Because nobody rises alone.
Every scar becomes a melody
When courage finds a tone.

That white dust on your temple?
Not weakness.
Not shame.
It’s evidence you’re still fighting
Through heat, through hurt, through flame.

You press the violin to your chin
Like you’re holding yourself together.
Because sometimes music is the only thing
That makes the breaking better.

You are not just playing notes.
You are playing proof.
Proof that beauty can bloom
From a cracked roof.

Proof that even when life grips tight
Around your throat —
You can still release
A trembling, powerful note.

And listen —
If the world never claps loud enough,
If stages never come,
If lights never find you —

Remember…

Somewhere a child hears you.
Somewhere a future sees you.
Somewhere hope believes you.

So play.
Even when your hands shake.
Play.
Even when your heart aches.
Play —

Because sometimes the bravest thing a soul can do
Is make music
While it’s breaking in two.

“He Carries Tomorrow”

He carries more than a child on his back,
He carries prayers he never learned to lack.
Calloused hands, but his heart intact,
A quiet warrior the whole world attacked.

This cross ain’t jewelry — it’s history’s weight,
Grandmother’s whispers about love over hate.
It’s nights he broke but still called it faith,
It’s choosing hope… when hope came late.

See, nobody clapped when he swallowed his pride,
Nobody saw all the tears he denied.
He learned to be strong ’cause he had to survive,
Not because strength didn’t hurt inside.

Little fingers tracing silver lines,
Learning courage between the signs.
On his father’s back — sacred shrine,
Breaking curses one day at a time.

He was never hugged the way he hugs you,
Still he builds what he never knew.
He fathers forward, stitches what tore,
Gives you the love he was never given before.

His spine bent early from burdens and blame,
From carrying shame that wasn’t his name.
From fighting battles without any fame,
From smiling through systemic flame.

But look —
Look how gentle he holds that child.
Look how trauma turns tender and mild.
Look how a man once broken and wild
Now guards a future undefiled.

If tears fall, let them fall free,
That’s what healing looks like, see.
A Black man rewriting destiny,
Planting roots so his son can be.

He carries more than a child — it’s true.
He carries tomorrow.
He carries breakthrough.
He carries a promise the world never knew.

And if you ever doubt what love can do —
Look at a father
And the way he carries you.

“Stand, Even When the Wind Calls Your Name”

They say be steadfast.
But they do not tell you
how the night stretches like an unending road,
how the wind will test your knees,
how loneliness can echo louder than applause.

Steadfast.

Like a tree that refuses to bow
though the storm has memorized its address.
Like a candle that keeps preaching light
while drowning in its own melting.

They say be steadfast—
as if it is easy
to hold your ground
when the ground itself is shaking.

But listen—

The tortoise did not win by speed.
The river did not carve rock by shouting.
And the sun does not beg the darkness
before it rises.

Steadfastness is not noise.
It is quiet loyalty to purpose.
It is showing up
when motivation has packed its bags.

My father once said,
“The lizard that jumps from a high iroko tree
nods its head—not for pride,
but to remind itself it survived.”

Sometimes steadfastness
is simply nodding—
“I am still here.”

When doors close like stubborn mouths,
when friends fade like evening shadows,
when dreams delay like unpaid wages—

Stand.

For the bamboo bends
but does not break.
For the eagle waits
but never forgets it has wings.

Steadfastness is faith
with its sleeves rolled up.
It is patience
with scars on its back.
It is hope
that refuses to retire.

You will be tested.
Time will question you.
Failure will laugh.

But remember—
a goldsmith does not fear fire,
for fire reveals what is real.

Stand in the fire.
Stand in the doubt.
Stand in the silence
when no one claps for your consistency.

Because roots grow deeper
in unseen places.
Because foundations strengthen
in hidden hours.

They will celebrate you later.
But now—
be loyal to the process.

Steadfastness is not glamorous.
It is repetition.
It is discipline.
It is choosing the long road
when shortcuts whisper sweet lies.

The farmer who plants today
does not harvest tomorrow—
yet he waters anyway.

So water your dream.
Water your discipline.
Water your becoming.

Even when progress looks invisible.
Even when results seem silent.

For mountains are not built in a day—
they are the testimony
of pressure that refused to quit.

And when the winds finally bow to your endurance,
when the storms grow tired of fighting you,
when the harvest answers your waiting—

They will call you lucky.

But you will know.

You were simply steadfast.

And that—
is how destiny is defended.

“They Say Men Don’t Cry”

They say men don’t cry.
They say iron doesn’t bend,
that thunder never trembles,
that mountains never sigh.

They say men don’t cry—
as if tear ducts were revoked at birth,
as if the Maker carved our chests from stone
and forgot to give us rain.

But even the sky breaks.
Even the clouds confess.
And no one calls the storm weak
for emptying its chest.

They say men don’t cry.
They hand us proverbs twisted like ropes—
“Be strong.”
“Man up.”
“Swallow it.”

But my grandfather used to say,
A river that refuses to flow
will one day flood the village.

Tell me—
what is strength
if not the courage to feel?
What is bravery
if not standing unarmed before your own pain
and saying,
“I see you.”

They say men don’t cry.
Yet David wept in the wilderness,
and still wore a crown.
Even warriors wash their wounds—
why then shame the water
that cleans the soul?

Listen—
A closed fist cannot receive blessings.
A locked heart cannot house peace.
And a man who buries every sorrow
plants a forest of silent wars inside his chest.

They say men don’t cry.
But pressure makes diamonds,
and pressure also makes explosions.
Which will you choose?

Brother,
there is no medal for suffocating.
No trophy for pretending.
No applause in the graveyard of emotions
where too many strong men lie
unmourned by themselves.

An Igbo adage whispers,
“The child who hides his illness
dies in silence.”

So why hide the ache?
Why mask the fracture?
Even the tallest iroko tree
needs the rain.

Crying is not weakness—
it is wisdom leaving the body.
It is grief refusing to become bitterness.
It is pain choosing poetry
instead of violence.

A man who cries
is a man who refuses to drown
in the ocean of pride.
A man who cries
is a man who knows
that healing begins
where honesty breathes.

They say men don’t cry.

But I have seen fathers cry
when no one was watching—
tears falling like unpaid debts
for sacrifices their children will never see.

I have seen sons cry
in the dark,
asking heaven questions
they’re too proud to ask aloud.

And I have learned this:
The strongest walls
have cracks—
that’s how the light gets in.

So cry, king.
Cry and rise.
Cry and rebuild.
Cry and become.

Because the same rain
that falls in weakness
also feeds the harvest.

And when they say,
“Men don’t cry,”

Smile gently—
for you now know
that real men do.

And in their tears,
they are not breaking.

They are becoming.

Today, I don’t just celebrate your birth—
I celebrate a man who became my worth.
A man who stood when the storms grew loud,
Who wore his pain like a silent shroud.

You were never perfect—no, not at all,
But somehow you still answered every call.
In moments when life tried breaking me down,
You showed me strength without making a sound.

You taught me that courage isn’t the absence of fear,
It’s standing your ground when the end feels near.
You watered my dreams when they started to dry,
Placed hope in my hands and said, “Try… just try.”

And I saw you—
Not just as “Dad,” but as a man with scars,
Fighting quiet battles, carrying invisible wars.
Yet you never let your weakness become my weight,
You turned your struggles into lessons of fate.

Even when life pulled you in every direction,
You still found time for my correction—
Not with anger, but wisdom deep,
The kind that plants roots your soul can keep.

You showed up.
Again. And again. And again.
Not always loud—but always present.
Not always strong—but always enough.

And that… that is love in its purest form.

You became my compass when I lost my way,
My shelter on every unpredictable day.
Your voice still echoes in choices I make,
Every step forward is a path you helped shape.

So today, I don’t just say “Happy Birthday”—
I say thank you…
For the sacrifices you never announced,
For the prayers you whispered when hope was discounted,
For being human… yet still my hero in disguise.

Because the truth is—
I didn’t need perfection.
I needed you.

And you were there.
Always there.
Still here.

Happy birthday, Dad.

Today, we celebrate the women who became strong so we could be soft…
who carried dreams in one hand and responsibilities in the other.

To our mothers — we see you.
We see the sleepless nights you never complained about.
We see the meals you skipped so we could eat twice.
We see the prayers you whispered when we didn’t even know we were in danger.

We see the sacrifices.
The silent battles.
The postponed dreams.

You carried burdens so heavy, yet you carried us like we weighed nothing.
You gave up pieces of your youth so we could have a future.
And even when life pressed you down, you still showed up — with strength, with grace, with love.

We may not say it every day, but we notice.
We appreciate.
We are grateful.

And we promise — to work hard, to grow, to become everything you prayed for.
To make you proud.
To give you the life you deserved but put on hold for us.

Today we rise in church pews and quiet gratitude,
celebrating the women who carried us before we carried attitudes.

Motherhood is not just soft lullabies and Sunday smiles,
it is midnight prayers whispered across tired miles.
It is love that cooks when the body is weak,
faith that stands when the future looks bleak.

It is sacrifice dressed in wrapper and grace,
strength with gentle lines on her face.

To every mother — biological, spiritual, chosen by heart —
thank you for giving pieces of yourself from the very start.

Happy Mother’s Sunday 🤍
Your love is the first sermon we ever heard… and the one we never forget.

Happy Mother’s Sunday to every mother and every mother-figure.
Your sacrifices are not forgotten.
Your love is not unnoticed.
Your strength built generations. ❤️

“I Was Never the Monster”

“I was never the monster.”

That’s what mercy whispered
When shame tried to rename me.

When my worst mistake
Became my loudest introduction.
When my failure walked into rooms
Before I did.

“I was never the monster.”

Yes, I fell.
Yes, I wandered.
Yes, I let appetite
Outrun discipline.

But I was never
The headline of my weakness.

Sin stained me—
It did not author me.

And mercy—
Mercy knew the difference.

Because mercy does not look at you
And see a beast to be buried.
It sees a son misled.
A daughter misplaced.
A heart that forgot its address.

We are too quick to label.
Too quick to cancel.
Too quick to carve people
Into permanent villains.

One mistake—
And we build a cage.
One scandal—
And we write a page
That erases every good thing
They’ve ever done.

But hear the gospel rhythm—

The cross was not built
For monsters.
It was built
For image-bearers
Who lost their reflection.

“I was never the monster.”

I was the prodigal
Who thought distance meant freedom.
I was Peter
Swearing loyalty at dinner
And denying it by firelight.
I was David
With worship on my lips
And weakness in my will.

Flawed? Yes.
Broken? Absolutely.
But never beyond
The reach of mercy.

And if that is true for me—
It must be true for them.

The addict is not a monster.
The angry man is not a monster.
The girl who chose wrong
Is not a monster.

They are stories
Still being written.

Mercy understands
That behavior is loud—
But identity is deeper.

Mercy says,
“I will confront the sin
Without crucifying the soul.”

Mercy says,
“I refuse to reduce you
To your worst chapter.”

Because if God had called you
What you acted like—
You would not be here.

If He had defined you
By your darkest night—
You would not see light.

But He looked at you—
In rebellion.
In denial.
In compromise.

And said,
“Mine.”

That is mercy.

So the next time someone falls,
Before you sharpen your stones,
Remember the days
You barely made it home.

Remember the prayers
You prayed in secret.
Remember the grace
That met you
Before consequences could complete you.

You were never the monster.

And neither are they.

Just people
In desperate need
Of the same mercy
That kept your name
From becoming your ruin.

We are not monsters.

We are miracles
Still under construction.