Tainted
rose petals
Indelible
stain of pain
Pulsing
on a bed of golden thorns
Anathema
Dangling
from the orifice
Of
a new dawn
Signs
of sorrow etched
Into
sparkling diamonds
Sweat
laced with tears and fears
Trickle
down bronze monuments
As
cobwebs sneak up silver walls
Anathema
Soaks
up the clouds
Blackening
blue skies
Listen…
The
birds are mute
Feel…
The
breeze freeze in flight
Watch…
Love-trains
grind to a disheartening halt
Hear…
Stale
discordant cords sighing
Smell…
The
stench of the end of time
As
it gallops here
Anathema
Lands
On
our roof
sometimes when you write like this, i feel your true intent is to keep out all the world (if not to make it impossible to understand). i get the impression that the end time may be your subject of discussion but the pieces still don't seem to add up. is it then right to conclude thus or is there something i`m overlooking?
ReplyDeleteThink of the arrival of the west, slave trade and Africa and let's see if it becomes clearer. Honestly, it is not intentional..i think of something, it affects my emotions and it's translated into words. I have some control over my choice of words, but mind you, it's not complete control.
ReplyDeleteit is still not too clear. pls, could u let me in on its meaning in plain terms and without ambiguity?
ReplyDeleteMy use of 'Anathema' here, means 'a curse'. i have painted a setting of despair, where the good that we (africa) knew has become a reminder of our pain. rose petals, our gold taking the shape of thorns, diamonds, (for which we know a lot of blood has been shed over -blood diamonds), it is as if we woke up one morning and a curse greeted us. It was a 'new dawn' that brought doom with it. Imagine life before the arrival of the west.life was here with us. Mind you, civilisation begun in Egypt - and it was a black Egypt. Now, after all they have stripped us of, we are still at their mercy. The end of time is just a metaphor for the super powers of the world. They are still an unavoidable curse. And whether we like it or not, they are perched on our roofs. our dependence on them is serious, they can make us bend to their will very easily, they do it in subtle or blatant ways..it is not ending anytime soon.
ReplyDeletevery clear now ...beautiful piece ...thanks...
ReplyDeleteI'm glad it is now.
ReplyDeletenow that i think on it more intently,i am forced to wonder what Africa would have been like without the coming of the west.this is not an overgrowth of African inferiority complex but a layman's conscious effort at commenting on such an important issue impartially and without letting feelings get the better of reason. before those evil men came, tribal and national rivalries helped us to lose our best men in needless war . outmoded practices, like FGM and burying the dead with a (living) man or woman to help the dead one in the underworld or the journey thereof, threatened the sanity and the very continuity of our race. and yes, the white man came with a big Bible and a gun in it, but after all his wickedness, we too have come to understand God better.we may have been the first to see the light but the gods of wood and clay we made for ourselves, gods who need babysitting , whisked it away from us and plunged us further into the dark. and who said the first cannot be the last,anyway?besides,slavery and imperialism are age-long concepts;let us not pretend Africa was not a perpetrator of these crimes before the 'anathema'. there is no gainsaying the fact that a great deal of harm was done but i believe as Christians ,who must live one day at a time, ours is forgiveness which leads to reconstruction. for non-Christians who don't have forgiveness in their lexicon, it is worth noting that if you spend everyday complaining about what could have been ,you may never see what's coming because you become more co-joined with the past that you suffer detachment with the present as well as the future. let us toss the`dark ages` aside as stemming from chaos of a disoriented epoch and come home to reality-the problems of Africa are African and they must find solutions here. enough of the blame game!
ReplyDeleteWell stated points, my friend. But one cannot be one-sided on issues, so please understand when I say it all. I do acknowledge that we are to blame for some things if not most. Being a Christian, I also acknowledge we had to get to know Christ somehow. But we cannot, for the sake of history, fail to talk about the atrocities from their end too. I try to say it all, that's all. The blame is shared. Africa was a human place before the arrival of the west so definitely, our nature of being prone to what is dark and wrong will manifest. Don't get me wrong, I am in no way preaching that we should be unforgiving of the past, no. All I am laying down are reflections on aspects of our past. How it is still a part of our present. We cannot forget where we came from. It is necessary to know all facts in order to find solutions. Africa has problems but they all don't stem from Africa, I must say. Maybe I am being biased cos of all the readings I have had to do on African and African-American issues this semester, and mind you, those issues are not stuck in the past...they have traveled into the present and so disturbing is that fact that it is still present, my skin crawls at the thought of some things. We have African-Americans in that class, and you should hear what they have to say. The blame is shared. it is shared.
ReplyDeleteHmmm...Interesting argument. I think you are both right. 'Anonymous', you have a point in saying that the problems of Africa is Africa, but I agree with Hannah about the fact that some of the evil things that were being done to Africans are, in one way or the other, being repeated, especially on our African-American siblings. I'm not saying that we should sit at one corner and wallow in our sorrows, crying over spilled milk. No. I'm just saying that the milk that has been spilled needs to be wiped off the ground, so that we and the other members of the house hold would not walk over it and slip and fall. Yes, Africa is the cause of more than 50% of its problems, and we need to tackle those issues. but the other percentage also needs to be addressed. 'Anonymous', don't worry, I'm sure that, in her next poem, Hannah will address the African-caused African problems. ;-)
ReplyDeleteHerh! How did you know what I will be writing next? eh? How do you know?
ReplyDeletelol...telepathy. but 'anonymous' has a point, you know. many pan-african poets cry and cry and cry over colonialism. but, Amma, colonialism was decades ago oo. anyway, we still need to inform our generation about the evil deeds that were done to us. that way, we won't make the same mistake twice (though i believe we already have...many times!)
ReplyDelete