CRAFT OF FICTION

01 - 06 - 2008

Something there is now that lends me a bit

Of the peacock’s posture and a portion

Of the lion’s composure as well as the eagle’s carriage.

Whatever it is that forces folks

To prefer the broadcast of lesser harmattans for selves

Is as far from me as zero is from thirty-five

To be here now buoys me beyond poetry

The vulture pursued me to defecate on my head but failed’

The elephant picked on me from the multitude but lost

I am the kid that set out on a trip and returned a giant

My ancestors’ divination about me has come true;

They helped my cause who sought my downfall.

Little by little, the mustard inched on and won the birds.

The tree that would be material for the noble indyer drum

The noble indyer jumbo slit-long drum must first be tossed by storms.

Give way with your jealousies, you storm-choked corpses;

I must declare the assets of my hardihood.

Who has no horse should go ride his daar corn sheaves’ platform.

To be here now equips with a bit of cirakem tree’s patience

Who talks of forty and its Alom-the-hare-ness?

A fool at ten is a fool at twenty, is a fool at thirty

And forty and fifty and sixty… till time’s toes swell beyond cure

The chick that would crow is known the day it hatches

Adeyongu of Ninga my great grandpa is nodding in his grave.

I am the chick that crowed before it hatched

That right from infancy attracted vicious attention

But escaped by ishamhira grace and gafa prowess.

I am the light that shines and cannot be quenched

So at this rung of my pleasurably long ladder.

Let me hereby count my cowries so far before launching farther.

MOSES  TERHEMBER  TSENONGU

(Sun the Male Born, Moon the Female!)

©2005 New Nigerian Newspapers Limited.