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Nairaland Forum / Entertainment / Literature / Popular Works Of African Poets. (41163 Views)
17 Year Old Nigerian Starts A Project To Bring African Poets Together / A Collection Of African Proverbs / Famous Books Of African Authors (2) (3) (4)
Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 4:01pm On Apr 14, 2010 |
Erm . . . I was trying to find Abiku and a couple of other poems a few days ago and it was one hell of a mission. It seemed strange to me that we don't have a sticky topic on this section for works of accomplished writers. I just wanted to start this thread for those works we had to study those days. Also for poems that placed these men and women into international limelight. And maybe to serve as a reference for people on the internet. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 4:02pm On Apr 14, 2010 |
Abiku - Wole Soyinka In vain your bangles cast Charmed circles at my feet; I am Abiku, calling for the first And the repeated time. Must I weep for goats and cowries For palm oil and the sprinkled ash? Yams do not sprout in amulets To earth Abiku's limbs. So when the snail is burnt in his shell Whet the heated fragments, brand me Deeply on the breast. You must know him When Abiku calls again. I am the squirrel teeth, cracked The riddle of the palm. Remember This, and dig me deeper still into The god's swollen foot. Once and the repeated time, ageless Though I puke. And when you pour Libations, each finger points me near The way I came, where The ground is wet with mourning White dew suckles flesh-birds Evening befriends the spider, trapping Flies in wind-froth; Night, and Abiku sucks the oil From lamps. Mother! I'll be the Supplicant snake coiled on the doorstep Yours the killing cry. The ripes fruit was saddest; Where I crept, the warmth was cloying. In the silence of webs, Abiku moans, shaping Mounds from the yolk. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 4:04pm On Apr 14, 2010 |
The Renegade - David Diop My brother you flash your teeth in response to every hyprocrisy My brother with gold-rimmed glasses You give your master a blue-eyed faithful look My poor brother in immaculate evening dress Screaming and whispering and pleading in the parlours of condescension We pity you Your country's burning sun is nothing but a shadow On your serene ‘civilized’ brow And the thought of your grandmother's hut Brings blushes to your face that is bleached By years of humiliation and bad conscience And while you trample on the bitter red soil of Africa Let these words of anguish keep time with your restless step Oh I am lonely so lonely here. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 4:13pm On Apr 14, 2010 |
Not My Business - Niyi Osundare They picked Akanni up one morning Beat him soft like clay And stuffed him down the belly Of a waiting jeep. What business of mine is it So long they don't take the yam From my savouring mouth? They came one night Booted the whole house awake And dragged Danladi out, Then off to a lengthy absence. What business of mine is it So long they don't take the yam From my savouring mouth? Chinwewent to work one day Only to find her job was gone: No query, no warning, no probe - Just one neat sack for a stainless record. What business of mine is it So long they don't take the yam From my savouring mouth? And then one evening As I sat down to eat my yam A knock on the door froze my hungry hand. The jeep was waiting on my bewildered lawn Waiting, waiting in its usual silence. 1 Like 1 Share |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 4:22pm On Apr 14, 2010 |
Ibadan - J.P. Clark Ibadan, running splash of rust and gold-flung and scattered among seven hills like broken china in the sun. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 4:24pm On Apr 14, 2010 |
Abiku - J.P Clark Coming and going these several seasons, Do stay out on the baobab tree, Follow where you please your kindred spirits If indoors is not enough for you. True, it leaks through the thatch When flood brim the banks, And the bats and the owls Often tear in at night through the eaves, And at harmattan, the bamboo walls Are ready tinder for the fire That dries the fresh fish up on the rack. Still, it's been the healthy stock To several fingers, to many more will be Who reach to the sun. No longer then bestride the threshold But step in and stay For good. We know the knife scars Serrating down your back and front Like beak of the sword-fish, And both your ears, notched As a bondsman to this house, Are all relics of your first comings. Then step in, step in and stay For her body is tired, Tired, her milk going sour Where many more mouths gladden the heart. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 4:32pm On Apr 14, 2010 |
We Have Come Home - Lenrie Peters We have come home From the bloodless wars With sunken hearts Our booths full of pride- From the true massacre of the soul When we have asked ‘What does it cost To be loved and left alone’ We have come home Bringing the pledge Which is written in rainbow colours Across the sky-for burial But is not the time To lay wreaths For yesterday’s crimes, Night threatens Time dissolves And there is no acquaintance With tomorrow The gurgling drums Echo the stars The forest howls And between the trees The dark sun appears. We have come home When the dawn falters Singing songs of other lands The death march Violating our ears Knowing all our loves and tears Determined by the spinning coin We have come home To the green foothills To drink from the cup Of warm and mellow birdsong ‘To the hot beaches Where the boats go out to sea Threshing the ocean’s harvest And the hovering, plunging Gliding gulls shower kisses on the waves We have come home Where through the lighting flash And the thundering rain The famine the drought, The sudden spirit Lingers on the road Supporting the tortured remnants of the flesh That spirit which asks no favour of the world But to have dignity. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 4:40pm On Apr 14, 2010 |
Olokun - J.P Clark I love to pass my fingers (As tide thro' weeds of the sea And wind the tall fern-fronds) Thro' the strands of your hair Dark as night that screens the naked moon: I am jealous and passionate Like Jehovah, God of the Jews, And I would that you realise No greater love had woman From man than the one I have for you! But what wakeful eyes of man, Made of the mud of this earth, Can stare at the touch of sleep The sable vehicle of dream Which indeed is the look of your eyes! So drunken, like ancient walls We crumble in heaps at your feet; And as the good maid of the sea, Full of rich bounties for men, You lift us all beggars to your breast. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by ravenzord(m): 6:03am On Apr 15, 2010 |
This thread reminds me of a text I had back in sec school; West African Verse. That book had virtually all the good West African poems. It's a pity very few Nigerians appreciate literature . |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by Moyola(f): 9:24am On Apr 15, 2010 |
Oh I remember "Not My Business"!! Wud av to dig out ma Anthology |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by estrella(f): 1:13pm On Apr 15, 2010 |
This thread reminds me of my literature days in secondry school, How I miss those periods of indepth reading and analysis! @elde, more puleese!! |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 6:25pm On Apr 15, 2010 |
@Moyola, Ravenzord and Estrella You don't know how shocked I am that three people replied on this topic. Do you guys have any ones, you should post em. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by Moyola(f): 10:24am On Apr 16, 2010 |
Aite! Vultures - Chinua Achebe In the greyness and drizzle of one depondent dawn unstirred by harbingers of sunbreak a vulture perching high on broken bone of a dead tree nestled close to his mate his smooth bashed-in head, a pebble on a steam rooted in a dump of gross feathers, inclined affectionately to hers. Yesterday they picked the eyes of a swollen corpse in a water-logged trench and ate the things in its bowel. Full gorged they chose their roost keeping the hollowed remnant in easy range of cold telescopic eyes. . . Strange indeed how love in other ways so particular will pick a corner in that charnel-house tidy it and coil up there, perhaps even fall asleep - her face turned to the wall! . . .Thus the Commandant at Balsen Camp going home for the day with fumes of human roast clinging rebelliously to his hairy nostrils will stop at the wayside sweet-shop and pick up a chocolate for his tender offspring waiting at home for Daddy's return. . . Praise bounteous providence if you will that grants even an ogre a tiny glow-warm tenderness encapsulated in icy caverns of a cruel heart or else despair for in the very germ of that kindred love is lodged the perpetuity of evil. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by mukina2: 12:55pm On Apr 16, 2010 |
Nice topic! . : reminds me of my lit teacher seeing this poems back here . rewind to few years ago, in-depth analysis, reading, imagery, diction,figures of speech, diction, and the likes .mehn then it was all fun. Freetown, Blood Money and the bosom of the sea by Sly Cheney Coker The Dry Season and The executioner's dream by Kwesi Brew (powerful poem) ours to plough not to plunder - Niyi osundare Abiku by J.P clark we have come home- Lenrie peters (met this man) No Coffin No Grave- Jared Angira |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by Jarus(m): 2:00pm On Apr 16, 2010 |
@ Muki, So you also read Niyi Osundare |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by mukina2: 4:27pm On Apr 16, 2010 |
Yeah Jarus i actually did Abiku,Ours to Plough not to plunder, we have come home, freetown, the executioners dream and few others in school The Breast of the Sea by Sly Cheney Coker After our bloody century, the sea will groan under its weight, somewhere between breasts and anus. Filled with toxins, her belly will not yield new islands even though the orphans of East Timor wish it so. The sea is only capable of so much history: Noah's monologue, the Middle Passage's cargoes, Darwin's examination of the turtle's shit, the remains of the Titanic, and a diver's story about how the coelacanth was recaptured. Anything else is only a fractured chela we cannot preserve, once the sea's belly has washed itself clean of our century's blight. Throbbing, the sea's breasts will console some orphans, but Sierra Leone won't be worth a raped woman's cry, despite her broken back, this shredded garment, her hands swimming like horrors of red corals. But do you, O Sea, long-suffering mistress, have the balm to heal the wound of her children, hand to foot the axe, alluvial river flowing into you? Blood Money by Sly Cheney Coker Along the route of this river, with a little luck, we shall chance upon our brothers' fortune, hidden with that cold smile reserved for discreet bankers unmindful of the hydra growing fiery mornings from our discontent Wealth was always fashionable, telluric, not honor pristine and profound. In blasphemous glee, they raise to God's lips those cups filled with ethnic offerings that saps the blood of all human good. Having no other country to call my own except for this one full of pine needles on which we nail our children's lives, I have put off examining this skull, savage harvest, the swollen earth, until that day when, all God's children, we shall plant a eureka supported by a blood knot. And remorse not being theirs to feel, I offer an inventory of abuse by these men, with this wretched earth on my palms, so as to remind them of our stilted growth the length of a cutlass, or if you prefer the size of our burnt-out brotherhood. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by Dimka76(m): 7:54pm On Apr 17, 2010 |
Eldee! Goodman! Pls , I request for ''Songs of sorrow''. Kofi Awoonor Williams. ''Africa'' Cant rem author. Dennis Brutus is cool too. Very passionate. Gabriel Okara. Call of the river nun? The Vultures. I really love dis. When am happy I recite poetry to maself only o. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 8:16pm On Apr 17, 2010 |
Call of The River Nun - Gabriel Okara I hear your call I hear it far away; I hear it break the circle Of these crouching hills I want to view your face Again and feel your cold Embrace; or at your brim To set myself and Inhale your breath ; or Like the trees, to watch My mirrored self unfold And span my days with Song from the lips of dawn. I hear your lapping call; I hear it coming through; Invoking the ghost of a child Listening , where rivers birds hail Your silver –surface flow My river’s calling too Its ceaseless flow impels My found ‘ ring canoe down Its inevitable course. And each dying year Brings near the sea – bird call, The final call that Stills the crested waves And breaks in two the curtain Of silence of my upturned canoe O incomprehensible God! Shall my pilot be My unborn stars to that Final call to Thee O my river’s complex course? |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 8:28pm On Apr 17, 2010 |
Songs of Sorrow - Kofi Awoonor Dzogbese Lisa has treated me thus It has led me among the sharps of the forest Returning is not possible And going forward is a great difficulty The affairs of this world are like the chameleon faeces Into which I have stepped When I clean it cannot go. I am on the world’s extreme corner, I am not sitting in the row with the eminent But those who are lucky Sit in the middle and forget I am on the world’s extreme corner I can only go beyond and forget. My people, I have been somewhere If I turn here, the rain beats me If I turn there the sun burns me The firewood of this world Is for only those who can take heart That is why not all can gather it. The world is not good for anybody But you are so happy with your fate; Alas! the travelers are back All covered with debt. Something has happened to me The things so great that I cannot weep; I have no sons to fire the gun when I die And no daughter to wail when I close my mouth I have wandered on the wilderness The great wilderness men call life The rain has beaten me, And the sharp stumps cut as keen as knives I shall go beyond and rest. I have no kin and no brother, Death has made war upon our house; And Kpeti’s great household is no more, Only the broken fence stands; And those who dared not look in his face Have come out as men. How well their pride is with them. Let those gone before take note They have treated their offspring badly. What is the wailing for? Somebody is dead. Agosu himself Alas! a snake has bitten me My right arm is broken, And the tree on which I lean is fallen. Agosi if you go tell them, Tell Nyidevu, Kpeti, and Kove That they have done us evil; Tell them their house is falling And the trees in the fence Have been eaten by termites; That the martels curse them. Ask them why they idle there While we suffer, and eat sand. And the crow and the vulture Hover always above our broken fences And strangers walk over our portion. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 8:45pm On Apr 17, 2010 |
The Excecutioner's Dream - Kwesi Brew I dreamt I saw an eye, a pretty eye, In your hands, Glittering, wet and sickening; Like a dull onyx set in a crown of throns, I did not know you were dead when you dropped it in my lap. what horrors of human sacrifice Have you seen, executioner? What agonies of tortured men Who sat through nights and nights of pain; Tongue tied by the wicked sappor; Gazing at you with hot imploring eyes? These white lilies tossed their little heads then In the moon-steeped ponds; There was bouncing gaiety in the crisp chirping Of the cricket in the undergrowth, And as the surf-boats splintered the waves I saw the rainbow in your eyes And the flash of your teeth; As each crystal shone, I saw sitting hand in hand with melancholy A little sunny child Playing at marbles with husks of fallen stars, Horrors were your flowers then, the bright red bougainvilled. They delighted you. Why do you now weep And offer me this little gift Of a dull onyx set in a crown of throns? |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 8:47pm On Apr 17, 2010 |
@Muki You did The Excecutioner's Dream too?? Maynne, that was my favourite poem. Just mention 'Imagery' and you'll get an A 1 Like |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 8:49pm On Apr 17, 2010 |
Lest We Should Be The Last - Kwesi Brew Lest we should be the last To appear before you We left our corn in the barn And unprepared we followed The winding way to our hut Our children begged for water From the woman bearing golden gourds On their heads And laughing on their way from the well But we did not stop, Knowing that in your presence Our hunger would be banished And our thirst assuaged By the flowing milk of our words Now we have come to you And are amazed to find Those you have loved and respected Mock you to your face |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by chamotex(m): 8:51pm On Apr 17, 2010 |
see Eldee wan turn poet by force. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 8:59pm On Apr 17, 2010 |
chamotex: Oya . . . go back to Sexuality Section. This is for mature minds |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by mukina2: 11:42pm On Apr 17, 2010 |
eldee:i love the poem, very deep we used to pick out stuff stanza by stanza mehn it is a powerful poem . |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by Dimka76(m): 9:54am On Apr 18, 2010 |
Tanx man, I have saved the page! i THINK J.P. Clark's Abiku is light years ahead Soyinka's. What you say? But its all perspective though. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by semid4lyfe(m): 8:03am On Apr 19, 2010 |
Lol. . .All of a sudden, everyone appreciates African Literature. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by mukina2: 10:54am On Apr 19, 2010 |
^ Just 'cause people didnt post/vist here often does not in any way imply that they do not appreciate African literature. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 11:38am On Apr 19, 2010 |
Dimka 76: On the surface . . . but if really look inside and forget J.P Clark's use of enjambment, you'll see how Soyinka actually told a better story. While J.P Clark was just looking at it from the point of view of the human passer-by advocating for the mother, Soyinka more like fights the case of the Abiku child. It's more interesting to see his explanation for why Abiku actually likes to die . . .'Once and the repeated time, ageless'. Soyinka's Abiku is egoistic and even tells them about his superhuman abilities. I kinda prefer the super-hero Abiku not J.P Clark's suffering one. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 11:40am On Apr 19, 2010 |
semid4lyfe: Yeah . . . I think it's because the Government gave us money for posting on the thread. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by lannre(m): 4:52pm On Apr 19, 2010 |
Please someone help me on this lyrics- I cant even remember the Poet, But its from the book "West African Verse" "what time of night its is, I do not know except like some fish, dope out of the ocean, " bla bla bla. I need a full lines. appreciating a response. Thanks. |
Re: Popular Works Of African Poets. by eldee(m): 9:29pm On Apr 19, 2010 |
I wish I could get to buy a copy of West African Verse. @Lannre That's Night rain by J.P Clark |
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