The cold in December

I always feel to be strong against the cold,
Which makes Funtua ‘dreadful’ since time old.
With the heightened harmattan haze from November,
Funtua becomes the ‘coldest’ Hausa plain in December.
The natives cherish this peculiar geography,
As a distinct part of their history.
‘Funtua’, you would hear it being said,
Is ‘where the cold makes the night seem dead’,
This is where the umbilical code of cold was cut.

However, I have been to where crushing cold,
Would but make Funtua’s to hastily fold,
And retreat speedily in search for shelter,
 “Gaba da gabanta”, as everyone jostles helter-skelter.
‘For every  cold situation, there is another much severer’,
Cracks on my skin, which appear drier and clearer,
Stand like a colony of maps horribly drawn,
My children would giggle as we exercise in the lawn,
Seeing dad’s legs covered with such funny cuts.

I feel like to say, when I see how
The piercing cold squeezes every bit of Vitamin D
Off my friends, whose heads also bald for want of Vitamin E:
‘Oh, blazing sun! Your shiny Excellency!
How I long for your 38°C,
I swear I can do with your 40°C,
When I could freely bask and feel thirsty,
Then eat those foods that are truly so tasty,
And have a dessert of our coveted kola nuts’.