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Letters to Marion
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49 John Nkemngong Nkengasong Letters to Marion (And the Coming Generations) 1 One savage night of lust breathes in a nose flesh and blood the morning wakes and ‘Hallelujah’ is the song of joy and innocence writhing in her cot begins a trek of passion grief and gloom along the labyrinths of time. 2 is there any comfort in what one loves if he found it hidden in a cloak? the cat is a stealthier philosopher and cries not when the owl scares the night with ominous songs there is comelier evil in the smiles of handsome men now that we must go to church to serve the devil now that the party and partymen must send politic winds on treetops whose leaves are shed now that our indignity must run fierce fevers in every nerve the cry of the owl has gone too wild, too long since Wandji, Wambo, Nyobe, Moumie, Jua... went abroad with blisters from tyrants’ knives and when our morning wakes our stalls are empty our history’s eclipsed in the fists of power and our fields littered with lives that had known life is there any comfort knowing the fate of a little girl writhing in her cot? 50 Letters to Marion (And the Coming Generations) 3 I mock civilisations and spit in the face of Africa’s independence life was not stone-breaking till the empire was auctioned for toy crowns those men were born when God was asleep they have never found peace in their graves. 4 there’s an image torments my sleep the land of prawns will know more plagues till the old men, their souls shall find a resting place and their blood smeared in the clan’s shrine as I speak ghosts in a troubled mirror laugh some weird laughter and a sudden flood of blood high like Mount Fako surges on from the mouth of the Mungo and everywhere agony shrieks. 5 Now’s the time to read my will... Children of, Cameroon, children of Africa Love your trades find fortune in imagination and bring the souls of men to life bring the lives of men to God find Fuandem askew in the nave and drink from springs that flow uphill. no more of the Mungo’s salty paste where shabby politicmen wash their wounds shame has chilled them to the bone because they put honour in an empty song and shed few tears when history climbers fell [54.198.146.224] Project MUSE (2024-03-29 07:17 GMT) 51 John Nkemngong Nkengasong no marbled mansions, no mammon piles the silver spoon, the golden beads these you shall not aspire a savage night has dulled their lustre and all civilisations have come to naught if they meant bitterer days and nights No, Marion, shed no tear nor walk on broken dreams stow away your prodigal soul from shallow ponds that drowned men’s lives and I drowned: turn to the gem of tradition turn to ancestral laws of right and wrong and find therein some hope some life that’s worth the life an ancestor knew the cult he lies beneath a cliff near the palace walls under a grassy mound no memory living passed by unsighing send imagination among those hills where valleys heap beyond valleys and find the hidden thing in the heart of the universe 6 there in the armpit of the cliff in ancestral rank the poet and Messenger be laid. on the tombstone these words are cut by friends who saw an image in a dream: Here dead Lies life Go gently by. ...