cant say why, accept the word affirmation wasn't doing it for me, and the name of this blog will probably change, until such time as i feel, ive struck the proverbial nail on the head.alternatively, i will just leave things as they are, female prerogative?
and possibly today, was just one of those days, so i was thinking much about emancipation and its journey to liberation, slave's have been freed, but liberation i think, is yet a work in progress? any comments?
in that vein, a poem, i,ve been reading
a far cry from africa
a wind is ruffling the tawny pelt
Of Africa.Kikuyu,quick as flies
Batten upon the bloodstreams of the veldt.
Corpses are scattered through a paradise.
But still the worm,colonel of carion, cries:
'Waste no compassionon these seperate dead'
Statistics justify and scholars seize
The salients of colonial policy.
What is that to the white child hacked in bed?
To savages, expendable as Jews?
Threshed out by beaters, thelong rushes break
In a white dustof ibises whose cries
Have wheeled since civilisation's dawn
From the parched riveror beast-teeming plain;
The violence of beast on beast is read
As natural law, but upright man
Seeks his divinity with inflicting pain.
Delirious as these worried beasts, his wars
Dance to the tightened carcass of a drum,
While he calls courage still, that native dread
Of the white peace contracted by the dead.
Again brutish necessity wipes its hands
Upon the napkin of a dirty cause, again
A waste of our compassion, as with Spain
The gorilla wrestles with the superman.
I who am poisoned with the blood of both,
Where shall i turn, divided to the vein?
I who have cursed
The drunken officer of british rule, how choose
Between this africa and the english tongue i love?
Betray them both, or give back what they give?
How can i face such slaughter and be cool?
How can i turn from africa and live?
DEREK WALCOTT
The poet, offers us an insight into the process of growth, through, or in spite of, a history of exploitation and prejudice, about the turning of negatives into positives. this would be relevant to all people engaged in the search for creative co-habitation. the poets of the english speaking caribbean have much to say to all those who care about the future, and who are prepared to look critically but constructively at the past.
VIVE LE REVOLUSION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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About Me
- africanfragments
- johannesburg, gauteng, South Africa
- passionate bout all things literary. dislike, stupidity and insincerity.
2 comments:
O' Africa. I don't know the first thing about you. They say you are the mother of the first homosapiens, I think your children have gone astray. I hear your people today suffer from the new world plague more than anywhere else, but I am saddened more by the cold blooded genocide that takes place within you. When I think of you, I think of the Kilimanjaro and the highlands of Kenya, but all I can see are the images of starving children of Ehtiopia. Things arent much different in my part of the world, we are treating ourselves as badly if not worse. I cant help but wonder why???
well, i would love to lay claim to being, the source of humanity as we know it, but of course, my ancestry remains closely tied to yours, yes, youve guest it...that rather large sub-continent called india.
having not as yet had the privillege of reaching killimanjaro's highest peak,i live in the hope of the some day.
why??? u say, cause those who reach summits of power, with access, to previously unknown wealth and power, forget where they came from, and pursue, the aim of filling our own pockets, cow tow to the likes of america, for aid that never reaches its intended target, and simply poverty breads, huge populations, you know the "geography of hunger"
sadly having faught so hard for africa's emancipation from slavery, the liberation from colonial rule, we have failed our people and continent, by aping, the methods of those we have expelled. the coconut syndrome i call it.
so people die, hunger continues, and african leaders, fight to retain power over emaciated people's.
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