Tope Adenle's Blog

  On the side where the hips won’t complain Looking into the past that begins on the surface of a wall   Eyes closed, Mind open Visiting memories, no pattern, just a journey     A collection of recollections But it’s not a dream

  The universe has it laid out if we think about the past before the present The experience is vivid If we allow our mind to reflect on it The sequence is clear if we connect the lines on our dossier That, which we are looking for, is there if we allow our energy to trust our surrounding The future is the mind, the hands, and the heart connection manifesting Time is missing, yes, check your sequence

Cords of water, released from fragile envelopes The sun has filled out a prescription The blessings that first come with A belief only those before the second can explain The rain is now dry, and our deeds have overtaken the smell of the earth It’s back to the beginning, the envelope is seeking its refill The sun is writing a new prescription Patiently, we wait for nature’s course For a journey that started before time was set But we wait Because those that came before the third called it a season But wait we must Does the sun write slow? Its time for those after the previous, to explain But their language is loose Those with the gift of indenting have their tongues tied But wait we must Maybe we were not waiting all along, it was happening, but we caught on too slow The truth, THE SUN WRITES BACKWARDS

  If only the living were free and dead, non-silent If only a few from the clan above sat at a table to speak with the lips of the heart If only the table forbid conversation about names invented before we understood English If only the permit to the table is honesty, and the language is sincere words devoid of sympathies If each table had a person from each continent, where everyone spoke about claimed people from a region marked by water What will be the topic? Would the privileged 7 talk about love and unity, or interest and plays Would everyone ask for restitution for crimes of the past Would the demands include grants or request for gratitude? Would slavery be discussed and consequences of this elaborated? Would there be women at the table, or would the men ask for space? Would the dead trust the heart of the living, I hope the irony isn’t lost on you? Would the table speak words? My view, the table is a reflection on a patent surface…The living seein...

Blessings of over-dwelling, resistance to acceptance The race line ends nothing more than the first round Continuous marathons with no umpire The amazing realities of self-inflicted pains caused by the mirror within Walking in bright alleys, shadow at home to reflect on past hours The beginning of concluded events, rigorous review of dossiers always on replay Deliberate diagnosis of no symptoms The mind has the power to press on pause The key to unique fatigue; the request for exorcism Parallel lines drawn on fasting flowing water Move closer and see! But there is nothing there…. all gone with time while the clock paused

Good morning said without looking up at the sky, in a language foreign and never heard An embrace with no hands stretched, substituted by candid gaze from the pit of concern The problem with sincerity, interpretations vs intentions, the dilemma with consumption The emergence of doubt, disbelief that clocks don’t tell, measured only by experiences But how do you experience that which is foreign, said in a language you don’t comprehend   Maybe emotion is what freedom of expression is, how many are truly free? Desire for neutrality, struggles with purpose for the purposeless; a neatly packed mess  Rising above this is choice, the power to worry about what you decide to give power to Thinning hair of a man whose days just began, so much power to worry and disbelief; in  oneself and people, in what is not said in things verbalized You see the victim is not us, it’s the part of the mind beaten during every intercourse with doubt The doubt in our minds? No....

Conversations filled with dreams, patience and worries Imaginations and reality, joys of not knowing Panic from knowing too much, perfect imperfections  The fear of being consumed, the love for new territory  The friend who name is foreign, the choice lit up by darkness The journey to who we are becoming, the missing steps to glory The inexperience of long serving leaders, the nightmares from their moments The fruitless silence of a loud debate, the love of a new enemy The string of hope and the lectures of religion The knife that binds the rope of unity, dividing stronger than a calm sea The missing page of our history, a narrative of people divided by wealth The agitation for progress, the desire to embrace the struggle   The undefined destination no one knows, the revolution of the selfish The enemy of growth, the missing companions, the evaporating youth  But my country needs help!

Ample space in a tight corner only the mind can reach Demarcation of will, recognition of distance only the eyes can see The gap between now and never, the end, only the soul can feel The middle point, a place where the Sun resides in water The reality of tomorrow is separated by sounds of insects and colours of round balls in sockets But is tomorrow really a reality, when does it start? The sun changes its cloth three times a day, the 3 rd is a bath that takes away glow and shine The routine third shift of the hardworking sun, the start of tomorrow At the 3 rd shift, the workman comes home for his bath In the arms of the same women beaten up during the day, the daily routine of passion and pain The sun never goes to bed. Wrapped in the embrace of his familiar stranger, he looks up at his space The uncertainty of no existence, the promise of reward, a destination lost somewhere in time The map is the soul and the fulfillment is a...

In my private moments, I replay conversations. I pick from a mental bank of those I had with people and others I listened or watched people have. My recent favourite is that the Pope had with a little boy, my guess is, he has lived less than 5 years. First encounter was on my phone, the language was foreign so I made do with the text which heightened my interest. On their faces I could watch emotions while the words complemented my visual. The event was an open session where people were allowed to come to the microphone and ask a question that the Pope provided an answer to. This little boy spoke tears into the microphone, he struggled with his words but his tears were clear and defined. He taught me that there is nothing immature about pain . The pope made the little boy come to him to whisper his question into his ear. The boy asked his question, the pope announced it to the world with the permission of the boy. The little boy wanted to find out if his late father whom...

One of the things that confused me was the balance between first impression and second chances, I probably would have delayed on decisions a few times because I honestly didn’t understand how both scenarios play, a far left situation or open mindedness required the embrace of both? Maybe conclusions are not conclusive, maybe full stops don’t really end sentences as the end of a paragraph doesn’t always translate to the end of the narrative. Time is easier told when both clock hands are on the same digit, confusion really don’t exist if there is a balance, my problem all along has always been imbalance, myopic vision maybe, the type with experience as the known corrective lens. As the years rolled by, I have embraced the gambler’s mind, my cards are not as important as the cards others show and the next round is always pregnant with promise. A gambler knows that cards follow little or no logic, its chance and opportunity, what is presented is inferior to what is n...

When The Bed Got Smaller A long conversation amongst friends who hardly saw one another, a journey down memory lane; a time before beards or lots of height difference. Talks about how far they have come as individuals and how far apart they have grown as people. I guess I have given away their sex, it was a conversation amongst young men. They spoke about everything, the careless moments, the time life started taking a different meaning, a meaning that signified that life is more than having fun, that advice given and advise taken are two different things, that the mind has a mind of its own and that it chooses what is relevant and what’s not, subjectively. They spoke about the time that depending on a group was support when pride meant accomplishing bragging rights together, they spoke about periods when the bed was large and convenient for all to sleep. Life has made their beds smaller, now they have learnt that the way we did is different from how I now do it, in so...

  Sometimes, sleep eludes me, I think this ‘rest vehicle’ takes my patience for granted, there are nights I wait several hours before I eventually get a few hours of temporary non-existence. On nights like this, I mostly think about things that I have done and those I haven’t but wish I had, I think about the world as it is: the chaos and the hustle, I think about music and women (smiles), for some reason I associate both together…………………. Women just like music can be calm and soothing, loud and annoying, sad but deep, happy and vain (like any Birdman hook) and some are a combination of a lot of the ‘good’ that you just have to call them beautiful in and out, they make you relate to a song like A Long Walk-Jill Scott. So on this night, sleep took a long walk without me, leaving me staring into space, then PHCN hit, darkness swept in swiftly but I stayed there still and calm and then ‘thoughts’ came to my bed, my thoughts laid beside me like a woman, wanting conversati...

    The most interesting stories are really never told, maybe because they raise questions like: is it true he/she didn’t?   Can one really walk away from that? I feel that the fact that there will be immense doubts in the actual occurrence of the event(s) is why such stories never get out. However, it isn’t that the stories are not told, they are only told to few people who might never tell a third party, even when they do, the origin of the story is excluded, the real cast never mentioned, like we say at work, this flow has too many open ends……………….. I will tell a story that a friend told me, I will abide by the guy code, a few revisions here and there, but the essence of reality will be duly preserved. So my friend told me………………………………………..The Genesis, he was out of town for work, he stayed in this hotel with amazing whisky collection, he noticed that at the bar, after all, my friend is the most disciplined alcoholic, does he drink? Answer: Like ther...

The mind is that story engine that moves with us, especially men. We all have that moment our mind wanders, an example is scanning the room for the most beautiful girl in the perimeter, and after a successful scan our mind starts the story telling, imaginations of all sorts. At that moment, the mind can imagine a kiss; can imagine a session of intimacy, can conjure that the lady is the admirer and the man the one being admired, it’s the mind, it has its own power, and it’s a great storyteller, but untrue ones. Imaginations are the stories the mind tell. As a man, trust me when I say that the best stories are always ‘the girl moment’, what I call, the Tony Braxton Moment: you just stare and wonder why she is that pretty!! Sometimes, the feet gets smart, we move towards the lady and start some conversation, you talk about everything that means absolutely nothing, the objective is simply to get her number, the strategy is to make her smile, laugh and probably touch your ha...

    At times, there is nothing more interesting than to talk and listen. I was at the lobby of a hotel, somewhere far away from where I call home, wifi in the room I checked in was weaker than that at the lobby, I wanted to read my mails but I fell in love with the tunes from a large piano at the lobby. The melody filled the space, for me it was calming, but for the man I sat few feet from, it made him talk more, he was the man that talked and listened, I was, that night, the man that listened and talked. Although I had never met the man, he talked and I listened, when I spoke he listened too, I spoke to no one but myself, he spoke with the keys of the piano, he talked all through, pausing only after each verse and then listened, to everyone and no one. He sat on a stool, the man that talked and listened.   I was the man that listened and talked, I spoke to no one but myself and I listened to no one but him-the man that sat few feet from me, the man on...

I feel that I have had the ear for good music for quite some time. As a young primary school student, play didn’t extend beyond doors unless on days both parents were out or my mum was extremely unwilling to be bothered about the little things three young kids make out as big issues. One of those days when mum was unwilling brought me in contact with music, I was very young, slightly taller than the TV in the divider but as I ran pass the noise box to enjoy the rare play time, my ears caught Tony Braxton’s music, there was something soothing there, and when my eyes decided to find out who made the joyful noise, I was glad it did, because there on the screen was a beautiful woman singing melody, I was in love, devoid of sex, pure love for something, the kind of love that controls attention. Momentarily I wasn’t sure if it was for Tony or for Music itself but I loved the woman for a while. Then I grew to be fond of Music, it was sweet to my mind as it extended beyond the ears. Ther...

While this is not a piece on how long it has been that I posted on my blog, it is significant enough that I point out the gap. Man above all animals has the greatest ability of all, ability to do what-at a time when it suits. Although, the formal setting of paid employment has been able to confine this ability, but its existence is undeniable, this ability is freewill, just like any human, it’s been long I wrote a blog, posted anything, why? Freewill, I chose not to, I was probably too busy, that is deceiving, I had leisure-Freewill is what it is/was. Freewill, that gleam in our eyes when instructions are given, that slight adjustment of posture to superior directions, total compliance to what makes us the individual we are, ignoring that individual we can be. Freewill, the reason why an annoyed man will beat his wife, the reason subordinates will choose to ignore direct instructions, the reason why man will never trust another completely, that ability to obey intuition rath...

When beautiful music stops, the rhythm stays….rhythm: a sequence with soul………….   This piece isn’t about music, but strongly connected in more ways than one, it’s about the human mind, the mind of the finer species (pardon that word), the mind of women. Just like beautiful music, after the last note, the rhythm plays in their mind. Often times, the expression ‘I miss you’ is generated…………….when they say it…It’s beautiful too. The music is time, minutes spent with the adored, maybe in convenience, momentarily or otherwise. The rhythm is the activities shared, always enjoyed by both. Most often than not, beautiful co-existence is a fundamental need for this specie, I feel it comes close enough to rank beside financial need, its strong, just like beautiful music, it’s a common radio request, the DJ seems to play so much of it but too little to satisfy. Like a radio station, ‘repeat’ button doesn’t really existence. The music here is good companionship-good time; the radio ...

On my drive to work today, I paid particular attention to the faces around me: the people, I didn’t segregate in any way, I looked at those in public buses and those in own cars: luxury cars and those in beat up ones, I noticed something was uniformly there in their faces, some sort of worry, a concern for something, it was expressed in the lines on their forehead, the reflex movement of their lips, something made them busy, even in traffic. My mind went back to another morning years’ back, I had my worries too just like my fellow road users, it was a Monday and I had a lot of pending activities, deadlines I could not meet due to reasons beyond me. What am I to do really? I braced up for the boardroom bashing, I shifted nervously, if someone was looking, It would have been there in my face, that sort of worry, a concern for something, expressed in the lines on my forehead, the reflex movement of my lips, I was busy, even in traffic. Then to my left I heard this sonorous goo...

I am not going to use the liberty that my blog provides me to claim that I am a top notch professional in business dynamics neither am I going to pretend that I have perfect understanding of the way business works from a 360 degree approach.   However, I know something for sure, time has changed, just like weather, an era has gone. Having established that I am not a CEO, just yet I must add, I have understood that the landscapes have changed. No longer will I tilt towards the thought that ‘Innovation is over, adaptation is all that is needed’. Contrarily to that school of thought, Adaptation is over; Innovation is all that is needed. This I strongly support.  I changed. Several books have thought these two diverse views, in my opinion, several authors have created best sellers from existing modules that either obey the Principle of competitive adaptation of existing ideologies or compilations that preach the Creation of non-existing opportunities. Before I...