THE GHOST OF A COUNTRY
For Chinua Achebe and Odia Ofeimun
1
The war is not over. Many bones
Down the line, you find combatants
In the last trench, soused
In the mess which flows
From the ulcerous umbilicus
Of the stillborn country; draped
In the shroud of Lugard.
2
The war is not over. Tribal chiefs
Dance at street corners, armed
With the long flywhisks of statesmanship.
The war is not over. Many bones
Jut out of shallow graves.
3
The gun retches over stubborn mounds.
And time mutters the sad tale of the Sun
Which still hangs in its breech-birth.
4
The statesmen beat the drum of war.
They are never tired of counting bones
Yesterday’s ghost teases the trigger of the gun.
Yesterday’s lie stirs the anger of the dead.
Yesterday’s bile riles the living and the dead.
The war is not over. The country
Loves to stew in its rheum and gore.
5
If you seek the milk of truth, the udders
Are ripped off by the legion of flies.
The war is a daily rite here. Tribal chiefs
Dance at street corners, armed
With the long flywhisks of statesmanship.
They hope to beat the drum of war
Till children rise to pick the gun
Where their fathers left off.
Obari Gomba--poet, playwright and literary scholar– teaches Literature and Creative Writing at the University of Port Harcourt. His poetry collections are Pearls of the Mangrove, George Bush and Other Observations, Canticle of a Broken Glass and Length of Eyes. He has been the Editor of The Muse, the journal of creative and critical writing of the Department of English at the University of Nigeria. He is presently on the board of Working Papers: the journal of the Department of English Studies at the University of Port Harcourt. His essays and poems have appeared in Culture Digest, Expression, Crucible, Sentinel, among others. He has also contributed chapters to book projects.
He facilitated the poetry workshop at the GCLF in 2012.
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