Wading the Tide

The Poet-Soldier

22 Tribute Our martyrs were correct they had the eyes to see but we committed suicide directing the uninvited legionnaire- - ‘‘protector’’ to his camp. I look over the horizon, the setting sun is blazing red, tortured to death by darkness, yet tomorrow if not the same son, another daughter of ours shall rise. This time our view has changed. We shall clap at the bang... bang! I fear what I see at the top of Fako, of Kilimanjaro, and unless the God of goodness intervenes, these volcanoes, shall vent their steam and the lava shall flow. The Poet-Soldier (For Major General Mamman Vatsa) The pen and the gun eternal opposites they be; the one deceptively calm the other deadly it looks yet the more deadly is calmness. Bring not the two together for the treacherous inferiority complex of the latter shall choke the Life-force out of the former like the breath from his lungs - Okigbo. ThenMamman, the two all in one a self at war with itself. the intellect and the beast, the beast in him won and his brains like his predecessor’s splattered at a bang. 23 Wading the Tide Divorce such marriages let the pen reign, guide and teach but contaminate no more those fingers that grip the noblest master with the touch of a brutish brainless metal. For too long I have mourned. add not another to the list and make idle brains honoured for the transition of men of substance. More into the secret cult delve that only the initiated may decipher thy tongue and the gun will be lost. And while the young and innocent shall learn the word, no more brains shall paint the dark walls of dungeons or plant poetic genius on lawns. The Light That Never Shone (For Bernardine Neh Doh) Generosity incarnate, gentleness personified, generous and gentle Bernardine what a pain oh sun, to set before rising? Our hopes were crushed out of us and like the juice from an orange fruit our hopes flowed from our eyes. Let not my silence deceive that late heart of yours, let not the fact that the priest fails to announce ‘‘for Bernardine, may her soul rest in peace,’’ turn thy love into hurt. Dear little one, I was just a kid yet to learn the needs of those in the eternal realm ...