today all the oratory nodded into me
are yearning to narrate their stories
the call and response form in African oral narratives
to help those of us who were shy speaking in public

it happens during prayers
it happens during ceremony
whose idea promotes group participation,
every word following gestured display

Most of the poetry collection is touching
and emotionally it shows natural nuances
or the other from the proverb recited
love in the choruses which everybody joined
including my grand mum with her loss gums

what I learned I dreamingly acted true
something we pray and sing along to
This first education I got to be a poet
good public speaker before schooling

my muse usually picks the story teller
in my local language for the week at random
a rebirth without losing touch with tradition
uh how the children love it when I recited

once I told a slave story of two children
But a critic spied and called me a racist
making gathering itself impossible
my confidence fell with names of the village chief

Do listen to your elders and to you parents I said
and told them; the village kids a tale
of some clan who refuse to listen
and how they were lost and stolen
to make a free state against their will

and I fought back with my juju poetry
knowing we must not bid bye to this art
or our children will take refuge in TV
rebirth of shyness and the idiot box

In primary school in the late 1980's
my teacher introduced story telling
but her mind was a colonized blank
learning nothing but published arts

My best moments as a child were samakaland
Something mama gives as we roasts yam
That it is what I hoped to give back
when the sung, chant, proverbs follows the art
display that transcend the communicative functions of language


how I love that scenery strengthening social cohesion
far from assuring to the status of writing art
how I love to read my own works
Urdeen tribal poetry at its best


The poet, under whatever name, always stands for the same thing—imagination. And imagination in its highest form gives him the power, as it were, of assuming the consciousness of whatever he speaks about, whether man or beast, or rock or tree,

Comments

Thanks for visiting my blog magazine. I'm glad to have found your blog, we in the UK need to hear more creative work from Africa about issues....
csperez said…
hi, just found this blog and find the poetry really powerful...is it okay to link to your blog from my blog?

stop by and let me know;

http://blindelephant.blogspot.com

peace
c
Anonymous said…
excellent poetry dont stop writing

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