A Stranger to Brewerville

Massa P. Nimely

My Country is now 178 years independent,

Yet I still walk through Monrovia like a stranger wearing familiar skin. 

Like a pagan before the Bible, I’m still blank to most of the residents. 

There is a name,

passed from lips to lips...

Like a place everyone has experienced but me.

Brewerville. 

They say people live there. 

They say dreams wake there, but just like the rural parts of Liberia, the roads rise like old smoke behind every passing foot. 

Every ride there is negotiation between survival and destination. 

To reach there and go back to waterside is like buying distance with your last breath of money. 

It’s said that people there survive on generators and patience.

And then there's me...

Standing outside the gates of my imagination, deeply seeking even the faintest image of it.

But it hides from me

like happiness hides from grief, 

like depression that arrives

without warning, reason, a name, or even a source.

So I search.

Like a fisherman at the edge of unfamiliar water, afraid to cast his net in the wrong direction, wondering which side contains life.

I think carefully but with an aroma of fear. 

Because words are sacred to me, and

Perfection feels like survival. 

So speaking of Brewerville without ever experiencing it feels scary; like feeding a crocodile even from afar, yet difficult to ignore.

Bio: Massa P. Nimely is a young Christian woman and devoted Catholic whose life is grounded in faith, creativity, and a deep appreciation for the arts. She is a business student, poet, and passionate lover of music, art, and basketball. She completed her secondary education at Mary Help of Christians Catholic High School in New Matadi, where she earned her high school diploma. She then continued her studies at Notre Dame Catholic College before transferring to Stella Maris Polytechnic University, where she is currently pursuing a degree in Business Management. Poetry found Massa during some of the most challenging moments of her life. She began writing as a way to process sadness and difficult experiences, using words to calm her heart and make sense of her emotions. What started as a personal outlet gradually evolved into a meaningful artistic journey. Today, her poetry reflects both her resilience and her growth, and she takes pride in sharing her work with others.