Apologies to my Grandfather
Apologies to my grandfather:
The old rusty Chief of the Likae clan
I can feel now
How humiliating and sad
The death of your World
It came in white gowns and crucifix
It came in khaki and boots
It came with bullets and cannons
It marched and warred
Your arrows and spears could not save
It held you down,
With iron tongues
Piercing your ears
With sharp talks
Talks of Heaven and Hell
It made you felt guilty of sin
Even when you were righteous
Than men of the Holy Cross
It separated you from the best of your friends
The religious Lovers
Of your kola nuts and palm wine
The sincere tokens of your hospitality
A worthy libation of drunken appreciations
It enchanted on you spells of strange gods
Gods, who now eats the brains of your children
Yet, suffer them to live
Only to drink the salty sweat on their faces and backs
The old rusty Chief of Likae
Please look up, right here!
6feets above the soil that conceal your rusty bones
Where your old hut stand no more
Here I stand
On behalf of my father and his rusty brothers
On behalf of your tribesmen
All who took to the sides of those that killed your world
I tender my sincere apologies
For what is dead is lost
What is lost is dead
Even when found
Can never be what was lost.
The old rusty Chief of the Likae clan
I can feel now
How humiliating and sad
The death of your World
It came in white gowns and crucifix
It came in khaki and boots
It came with bullets and cannons
It marched and warred
Your arrows and spears could not save
It held you down,
With iron tongues
Piercing your ears
With sharp talks
Talks of Heaven and Hell
It made you felt guilty of sin
Even when you were righteous
Than men of the Holy Cross
It separated you from the best of your friends
The religious Lovers
Of your kola nuts and palm wine
The sincere tokens of your hospitality
A worthy libation of drunken appreciations
It enchanted on you spells of strange gods
Gods, who now eats the brains of your children
Yet, suffer them to live
Only to drink the salty sweat on their faces and backs
The old rusty Chief of Likae
Please look up, right here!
6feets above the soil that conceal your rusty bones
Where your old hut stand no more
Here I stand
On behalf of my father and his rusty brothers
On behalf of your tribesmen
All who took to the sides of those that killed your world
I tender my sincere apologies
For what is dead is lost
What is lost is dead
Even when found
Can never be what was lost.
Unimke Ugbong is a poet and short story writer. Some of his poems are on Eureka Street Magazine and Coffin Bell Magazine.
