My father's house,
an adobe,
mud-and-wattle plus cowrie shell
synthetic mould,
cuddling our miserable, naked feet
and reminding us of the
ascetic nature of our sires...
Incommoding...
Incorporeal upliftments salute us
......
Kinsmen,
Let us bring ourselves together under the iroko tree.
There we shall (with our flaming eyes that have known no
Sleep all these past market weeks) alter the positions of the
Moon and stars.
There we shall rebuild our once formidable shrines,
Reshape the leaves of the iroko itself,
Strengthen their boughs and strip the branches of
Their protracted weakness,
Break every bridge that makes our one river two rivals,
......
In this arid circumstance,
on a collage of sacred pulses,
this pot —Heritage — merely sits,
smoked and besmirched by elements
of mundane faggots.
The stars have descended a little lower, to keep us —
My kinsmen and I —company on this night watch
On a newly roused African night.
We filch a little bit of the effulgence of the waking moon,
Reluctant, with the invasion of jealous clouds, their plumes
Fragile with inconsistency.
We rely on the luminescence of each other’s eyes and the trust
In our hearts
Tinder, broken by flying flickers of fireflies,
Shine through the breath of darkness, dis-virgining the chunky yolk
......
Woman, you must rise at dawn and light up
your oil lamp, for here comes the chronicler,
who must not meet you and your babe in weak light.
He comes with his big book, where the lines and verse
of the dead and the living carry with them
the lengths of vicissitudes.
He comes with the anointing oil, his quill feather pen
and the noble ink, and on his head flutters the
......
Trembling fragile forms, moored to gangly twigs,
undulate in beckoning oscillation.
Surging neighbored clusters of swishing verdant sprigs
shape a canopy in leafy constellation.
Both by sky and contrasting clouds caressed,
they shiver and vibrate on unseen stems.
Floating entities, affixed nonetheless,
like taps of impressionist color gems.
......
The stars have descended a little lower, to keep us —
My kinsmen and I —company on this night watch
On a newly roused African night.
We filch a little bit of the effulgence of the waking moon,
Reluctant, with the invasion of jealous clouds, their plumes
Fragile with inconsistency.
We rely on the luminescence of each other’s eyes and the trust
In our hearts
Tinder, broken by flying flickers of fireflies,
Shine through the breath of darkness, dis-virgining the chunky yolk
......
Woman, you must rise at dawn and light up
your oil lamp, for here comes the chronicler,
who must not meet you and your babe in weak light.
He comes with his big book, where the lines and verse
of the dead and the living carry with them
the lengths of vicissitudes.
He comes with the anointing oil, his quill feather pen
and the noble ink, and on his head flutters the
......
The title of his book is eponymous
And so was the title of his father's
Own book and his father's father's
Own book, stretching to the back
Frame of their family book club.
A family haunted by shadows of
Ineluctable sarcasm, each member
Waned early, greyed early by way
Of early emulous propensities.
......
In this arid circumstance,
on a collage of sacred pulses,
this pot —Heritage — merely sits,
smoked and besmirched by elements
of mundane faggots.