The pink-lipped sky stoops
To kiss the silver-bodied eucalyptus,
The pale sun slowly sinks
At the darkening sight of betrayal.
And I?
What have I to say?
What have I to regret?
Oh rose you were meant
To lend fragrance to my life,
Hurrah! to them who do nothing
see nothing feel nothing whose
hearts are fitted with prudence
like a diaphragm across
womb’s beckoning doorway to bar
the scandal of seminal rage. I’m
told the owl too wears wisdom
in a ring of defense round
each vulnerable eye securing it fast
against the darts of sight. Long ago
in the Middle East
Beggar,
There he stoops all day,
Wrinkled,
Grey-haired,
Senile,
With his stained beard, and his pavement bowl,
Hand hopefully outstretched,
Entreating,
Entreating with his eyes,
Entreating with his tongue,
Entreating with his hand,
Yet we saunter by,
Eyes earthwards riveted.
Sometimes a gnarled stick,
Sometimes none,
Always the filthy kanzu,
Cease, Laura, cease, suspect no more
This careless heart has learnt to love,
Because on yonder lonely shore
I still at pensive evening rove;
Because of Henry’s worth I speak
With eager warmth and sparkling eye;
Because his favourite haunts I seek,
And still o’erjoyed to meet him fly:….
But, Laura, should my faltering tongue
Refuse to speak in Henry’s praise,
My
Human reason is beautiful and invincible.
No bars, no barbed wire, no pulping of books,
No sentence of banishment can prevail against it.
It establishes the universal ideas in language,
And guides our hand so we write Truth and Justice
With capital letters, lie and oppression with small.
It puts what should be above things as they are,
Is an
Twice or thrice had I loved thee,
Before I knew thy face or name;
So in a voice, so in a shapeless flame,
Angels affect us oft, and worshipped be;
Still when, to where thou wert, I came,
Some lovely glorious nothing I did see.
But since my soul, whose child love is,
Takes limbs of flesh, and else could
Wines of the great châteaux
Have been uncorked for you;
Come, take this terrace chair:
Examine the menu.
The view from here is such
As cannot find a match,
For even as you dine
You’re so placed as to watch
Starvation in our streets
That gives your canapé
Ah! Namu-sayers!
At this time, kolas had been sent out for a wife for Kambili.
And what was Kambili’s first wife’s name?
Her name was said, Kumba.
They tied up ten kolas,
And went off to marry the beloved Kumba.
And brought her and gave her to Dugo’s Kambili.
It was the way of doing a marriage.
(Man, pay attention
I see thy smile; at times, May’s warm, young sun,
At times, December’s cold and threat’ning sky;
Thy woman’s hand aplucking at thy sword,
The lightning lurking in thy deep-set eye.
Alone, thy face a stage whereon doth play
Ambition, Hate, Lust, Murder; flitting out
And in the gloomy wings of thy dark soul —
A fearsome and a most
Take me home
Where your elders
Can see our love
Stash me not away from the sky
Where your elders we say
I am not a highbrow suitor
As my elders
Known everything
About our relationship
It has been called the last place on Earth
this equatorial wonderland,
land of roaring rivers and majestic mountains
beautiful, but so fragile – as a spider’s web.
Here elusive species gather together
on beaches, in forest depths and glades
as if they have something to say to each other –
and to us – about the risk of ecological ruin.
In
Hear my prayer, O heavenly Father,
Ere I lay me down to sleep;
Bid Thy angels, pure and holy,
Round my bed their vigil keep.
My sins are heavy, but Thy mercy
Far outweighs them, every one;
Down before Thy cross I cast them,
Trusting in Thy help alone.
Keep me through this night of peril
Underneath its boundless shade;
Mammy’s baby, go ter sleep,
Hush-er-by, hush-er-by, my honey;
Cross de hyarf de cricket creep,
Hush-er-by, hush-er-by, my honey.
Hoot owl callin’ f’um de ol’ sycamo’
‘Way down yon’er in de holler;
While de whip-po’-will an’ de li’l’ screech owl
Dey des try dey bes’ ter foller.
Hush-er-by, hush-er-by, hush-er-by, my deah,
Hush-er-by, hush-er-by, my honey;
Shet yo’ eyes an’ drap
You whom I could not save
Listen to me.
Try to understand this simple speech as I would be ashamed of another.
I swear, there is in me no wizardry of words.
I speak to you with silence like a cloud or a tree.
What strengthened me, for you was lethal.
You mixed up farewell to an epoch with the beginning
Give me a chair
and let me sit in in your midist
and praise poverty
and want.
The face of poor man
stays all crumpled up
by reason of the hunger and thirst
which are in is stomach.
A poor man knows not
how to eat with a rich man.
When he starts eating fish
he eat is head.
Poor harlot, Mary Magdalene,
Into the feast with trembling crept,
Past frowns that stabbed her with their hate
And falling at His feet she wept.
Self-righteous Simon spurned her there
And marveled that her sinful touch
Displeased Him not, but he forgave:
“Though sinning sore she love’d much.”
Brave, grateful Mary Magdalene,
When Peter all his faith had lost,
Pressed on
Has there ever been
since Stephen the Great
a time of peace and stability
when forest and soil thrived
and people lived and danced
in their traditional ways.
Rival powers of the day
have continually fought to possess
your rich dark earth,
your resources of forest and river,
of a populace to be taxed –
ammunition for future wars.
A wall is like a knife
It slices a city in half
One half is on the east
The other half is on the west
How tall is this wall?
How thick is it?
How long is it?
Even if it were taller, thicker and longer
It couldn’t be as tall, as thick and as long
I came back home and retired to my couch
Walking on a deviant road
Which seemed exciting but weary like a long voyage
I saw one imp spiteful like an inferno
That suddenly changed into three dragons
Their eyes were frightened and anxious like lion claws
I appeased the land with three white doves
And struck the ground with my staff<br
Tell them about an unflappable warrior
A warrior both at home and on the battlefield
The bird’s offspring on Ìrókò tree
Akalamagbo’s child with magical sight
One who walks ahead and notices people approaching from behind
Oníkòyí, who used a thread to bind the rock
With the witchery lines of Ayajo
Oníkòyí, who is undeterred by gunshots
Death’s son, disease’s
