A LETTER FROM A
PRISONER
On Sunday noon
When the sun sprouted
Gleefully bold behind
The curtain maze
Four men-in-black
With a darkish pistol
Pressed forward
Towards my domicile
And on each head
Sat a peaked cap that
Harmonized with their garb.
And their brogans beating
Bleak on the gritty ground
I
Was at my domicile
In the frontispiece
Wearing a piece
Of grimace on my phiz
When they popped up
Like a twiggy panhandler
In Agbado-Market,
Pleading for dough
With a pseudo grin,
"Sir are you...?"
"Yes, that's me, my name..."
With a doldrum phiz flared
"But, I am not Nelson Mandella."
They retorted sharply
With a hoity-toity regards
Tucking their guns
"...we just want you
In our office now,
To spare no time,
No time to spare..."
My heart plunged with fear
And cold bled struck.
My mouth was heavy with silence
And eyes teasing the hands,
And eyeballed it clogged free
Like a despicable thief.
I was trailing behind them
Like a flagging Dog.
I have no family.
Is this a Cinema?
Or nightmare, just
'Pulsating' the strings
Of my mind,
Playing my heart
Like a timbre bass-guitar?
'Oh, dream
Must be filming me!'
On the thoroughfare to hell
My mind flitted through time
I called to mind a well-off Man
In the neighbourhood
Whom I pleaded to nibble
From his dining table;
He scared the wit off me.
And muttered, "GO AWAY
YOU POVERTY-STRICKEN,
JOBLESS MAN...!"
In the nick of time
I heard his sharp screech
Accompanying the blubbering-wind
Which called to my ears.
He came, flapping his tongue
While striding to my doorstep
Scooting sand into the thin air
With his longish, fatty feet.
With a confused voice,
He uttered words beyond his mouth
Could carry, "For not paying
Ears to your pleads,
You rather payed me by shivering
The mirrors of my SPORT-CAR;
That was worth millions of naira...?
YOU CANNOT OWN THAT TILL
YOUR LAST STATE OF MIND"
'I have not misheard'
I stood boldly still,
"I am a Christian, dear brother
How can I do such evil deeds
In the sight of heaven's window,
He sees me even when
I spy my inwards..."
He, twice, flicked his
Two right five fingers
And said, "YOU WILL
SEE PEPPER TODAY."
In their calaboose
I was prison freed
And was tortured
To the state of death.
In the gasp of my breath,
I confessed still
"I DO NOT KNOW WHO DID IT
I ONLY SAW THE BROKEN GLASS
BROKEN INTO MY FEEBLE HEART."
Please.
Drink from my palm-wine
Bleeding heart
Do not take his words:
His mouth filthy clean.
'I gave a SILENT SCREECH'
"Can't you ask the robber
That peeped through
Our street last night...?"
They heard it.
At the moment
Face flushed
Hands drooped
(Their madness flushed)
And picked up with rage again -
I was tortured the more
I must
But plead guilty
I am innocent free
Who just lost my job.
I remembered vividly
'THE RICH OWNS THE WORLD
AT THEIR hefty FEET...'
My heart jolted.
On Sunday noon
When the sun sprouted
Gleefully bold behind
The curtain maze
Four men-in-black
With a darkish pistol
Pressed forward
Towards my domicile
And on each head
Sat a peaked cap that
Harmonized with their garb.
And their brogans beating
Bleak on the gritty ground
I
Was at my domicile
In the frontispiece
Wearing a piece
Of grimace on my phiz
When they popped up
Like a twiggy panhandler
In Agbado-Market,
Pleading for dough
With a pseudo grin,
"Sir are you...?"
"Yes, that's me, my name..."
With a doldrum phiz flared
"But, I am not Nelson Mandella."
They retorted sharply
With a hoity-toity regards
Tucking their guns
"...we just want you
In our office now,
To spare no time,
No time to spare..."
My heart plunged with fear
And cold bled struck.
My mouth was heavy with silence
And eyes teasing the hands,
And eyeballed it clogged free
Like a despicable thief.
I was trailing behind them
Like a flagging Dog.
I have no family.
Is this a Cinema?
Or nightmare, just
'Pulsating' the strings
Of my mind,
Playing my heart
Like a timbre bass-guitar?
'Oh, dream
Must be filming me!'
On the thoroughfare to hell
My mind flitted through time
I called to mind a well-off Man
In the neighbourhood
Whom I pleaded to nibble
From his dining table;
He scared the wit off me.
And muttered, "GO AWAY
YOU POVERTY-STRICKEN,
JOBLESS MAN...!"
In the nick of time
I heard his sharp screech
Accompanying the blubbering-wind
Which called to my ears.
He came, flapping his tongue
While striding to my doorstep
Scooting sand into the thin air
With his longish, fatty feet.
With a confused voice,
He uttered words beyond his mouth
Could carry, "For not paying
Ears to your pleads,
You rather payed me by shivering
The mirrors of my SPORT-CAR;
That was worth millions of naira...?
YOU CANNOT OWN THAT TILL
YOUR LAST STATE OF MIND"
'I have not misheard'
I stood boldly still,
"I am a Christian, dear brother
How can I do such evil deeds
In the sight of heaven's window,
He sees me even when
I spy my inwards..."
He, twice, flicked his
Two right five fingers
And said, "YOU WILL
SEE PEPPER TODAY."
In their calaboose
I was prison freed
And was tortured
To the state of death.
In the gasp of my breath,
I confessed still
"I DO NOT KNOW WHO DID IT
I ONLY SAW THE BROKEN GLASS
BROKEN INTO MY FEEBLE HEART."
Please.
Drink from my palm-wine
Bleeding heart
Do not take his words:
His mouth filthy clean.
'I gave a SILENT SCREECH'
"Can't you ask the robber
That peeped through
Our street last night...?"
They heard it.
At the moment
Face flushed
Hands drooped
(Their madness flushed)
And picked up with rage again -
I was tortured the more
I must
But plead guilty
I am innocent free
Who just lost my job.
I remembered vividly
'THE RICH OWNS THE WORLD
AT THEIR hefty FEET...'
My heart jolted.
Agbado is a town in central Niger (and a prominent family in Benin). The naira was introduced in 1973, making Nigeria the last country to abandon the £sd currency system, the popular name for the pre-decimal currencies once common throughout Europe, especially in British territories. The abbreviation originates from the Latin currency denominations librae, solidi, and denarii and was applied to the British pounds, shillings, and pence. There were 12 pence in a shilling and 20 shillings in a pound (though the penny was halved into halfpennies, which were halved into farthings). Its advantage was its use in mental arithmetic, since it afforded many factors and hence fractions of a pound such as tenths, eighths, sixths and, if the guinea (worth 21 shillings) was used, sevenths and ninths. (After the collapse of the Roman empire, Charlemagne reintroduced the system in the 9th century, and it became the standard throughout Europe; it was introduced in Britain by king Offa of Mercia. As former English colonies gained their independence, nost quickly abandoned the system, but the UK did not do so until 1971.)
ReplyDeleteOften referred to by his Xhosa clan name, Madiba, Nelson Mandela was an anti-apartheid revolutionary who served as President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999, the country's first black head of state and the first elected in a fully representative democratic election, and also served as secretary-general of the Non-Aligned Movement from 1998 to 1999. His birthname was Rolihlahla ("troublemaker"), and his great-grandfather had been king of the Thembu in Eastern Cape province. On his first day of school his teacher named him Nelson. After becoming a lawyer in Johannesburg, in 1943 he joined the African National Congress; he also joined the South African Communist Party and served on its central committee. He was repeatedly arrested for seditious activities and was unsuccessfully prosecuted in a 1956 treason trial. Although initially committed to non-violent protest, he co-founded the militant Umkhonto we Sizwe (Spear of the Nation) in 1961 and led a sabotage campaign against the government. In 1962, he was arrested for conspiring to overthrow the state and sentenced to life imprisonment. He served 27 years in prison but was released in 1990. Then he and president F. W. de Klerk negotiated an end to apartheid and organised a multiracial general election, and they jointly won the Nobel Prize in 1993. Leading a broad coalition government which promulgated a new constitution, he created the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to investigate past human rights abuses. He declined a second presidential term.