The waves pull at the lugs of the wind-smiling boat
Where jokes are thrown, and hope of home stays afloat.
But beneath the wood, in dark damp despair
The souls piled in bodies in chains gasp for air.
Captured in fields of butterfly-filled chanting grass
Where children's smiles once lit love in these paths,
Now wishing death, escape, drowning, as the waves tossed
Their past away, carrying them to the land of the lost.
Finally off the cramped hell of human faeces and decay,
On a dais where bids are called, and theyget whisked away
To serve the farm. This was freedom from seaborne pain
Just to be enslaved, and cut and hurt once again.
Their brothers off to Arabia, or further to the same fate
Had warned of this predicament, and now they're in their state
Hoping for a day when a heart is changed and the impossible
Becomes blood on this continent to unhinge their shackles.
***********
What's freedom?
The shackles have fallen off the scars
That held back my breath.
Opportunity smiles the seduction of the 14th of February
And I say yes, reach out, looking to a future, looking
Beyond to joy, beyond death.
The eagle soars to survey and seek its prey, as I ride
Peacefully building a future where my kids will be eagles
To pray the prayers that freed my heart, to dream the dream
That Washington, Lincoln and Martin Luther King dream, and
Put the whip back into its sheath.
***********
But my brothers are still stuck.
I watch as I soar how the nest of worms appeals to them.
The chain is gone.
They seek a new master to shelter them from the
Predators of the world;
They call to this master to take their cross, and bear
It, and give them some cotton to feed their fears.
Melanin comes to the table.
He builds a bull of gold, and they bow.
"Oh Melanin, you brought us out of the slavery in Egypt
Out of the Slavery in Libya, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait
Out of the bowels of the slave ships on the Atlantic,
You brought us out of slavery,
Now enslave us to your will.
Make us wholly thine. Where you command we will go"
So he did.
And beautifully decorated by their bull,
Now, their lives matter.
(c) nyonglema
Tag Archives: slavery
CFA #freeDOOM
“Si ton père est alcoolique et bois de la bière pendant que vos voisins gèrent vos finances, il boira du Hennessy dès qu’ils lui laisseront le contrôle : l’impact sur la ration journalière sera nul.”
—
He was screaming at my bent head, louder and louder,
And I tried to hide my face from his words: “Make no excuses!”
I hadn’t realized my explanation of why I’d chosen Bowser
Over doing the dishes would get such a lame label. “Excuse you!”
I thought to myself, as he poured words out to change
My mind, but it had wandered off…
I remembered when the excuse for the pain that paved every street of my city was that the colonial masters wished it so. I remembered the same streets turned red so that this pilfering could end, that we could decide by ourselves. I remembered independence.
I remembered when the excuse for the pain that paved every street of my country was that the white man had taken our brothers away in slavery. Poor William Ellison, the prejudice done to him by the white man must be the reason why APGAR scores are lower around me than they are in his state. I remembered abolishment…
but
Only for the slavery to the white man’s land, for we kept up the lucrative business of selling our kind to the Arab market, where no abolishment was in sight. Yes, I remember partial abolishment.
I remembered colonial currencies. This must have been the cause of the AFCON competition being withdrawn from Cameroon, or the civil unrest in Sudan, and Algeria, Cameroon. This must be why medical doctors get jobs in non-existent hospitals, or schools look different on paper than in reality (especially when buildings don’t exist). This must be the reason for social decay, the bane of investors, the pervasiveness of corruption and officials stea…mean embezzling. I remembered the CFA.
That evil currency which prevents roads from being built, prevents hospitals from being built, and extorts pregnant mothers waiting to deliver in urgency. It’s the CFA that destroyed the educational fabric, let problems fester into mini-wars, killed all moral and ethics in business, and stabbed the future à-la Julius Caesar.
Now he was screaming even louder and louder
But I just stood there, head bent, seeming to hear it all,
But my thoughts meandered off further and further,
Remembering it all, then dreading our persistent fall.
(c) nyonglema
Kanye was right…a little #Cameroon
"Who wants change?"
I stare at the last instants of my son
I bare my soul to the sun: scathe me! bathe me
In scars that will heal! The Saian
Promised that pain brings new shoots from the ground
But who shoots flowers from a gun?
But I see flowers rising from bullet-made mounds.
I stare at the last instants of my son
And bear my soul scathing under the sun. Sounds
Are muffled. Hope sang birds' songs
Before on the trees above my lawn. I don't know
That bird, but I sure know the song.
It was Schroedinger's cat predicting my future.
But who shoots flowers from a gun?
Nobody! Nobody believes anything else will come
Nobody bares their soul to the sun
That song is either dead or alive, but nobody's looking.
We all want to see that cat run,
We all want to hear that song, the bird's, you know
I stare at the last instants of my son,
For no finger will be lifted higher than abandon
No hand shall be lent, only backs bent in allegiance.
(c) nyonglema
399.99 #Libya #neoSlavery
In November more than 230 years ago a letter changed the course of history.
Lady Middleton inked hope in the heart of a British speck,
And no matter how small it saw itself, and made protest
The cause was so big that the Hope she sowed seemed 300 against Persian military.
Lil’ Bill set out to change the world before his eyes
That man wished to make men see in other men their brothers,
Like hounds view spaniels, or poodles, or chihuahuas,
And to think we’re supposed to be the smarter of the creatures.
Well, William Wilberforce, along with many intelligent beings
Set out to explain to humanity what animals already knew.
Today I feel sorry for him
That the lessons he fought for flew to forgetfulness.
I feel sorry, that it actually got worse.
I feel sorry that…I used to think I was worth “Priceless”.
That’s what dad and mum told me, we can’t buy you:
Protect your eyes, they have no price.
Protect your hands, protect yourself, you have no price.
USD 400, EUR 400, GBP 350, YUAN 3 125, XAF 260 k.
Print me a tag, stick me in a Home Depot store as an accessory
I’m more economical than a Roomba.
Pass it through my earlobe,who needs a jackhammer to build
When you can get me, and for cheap?
Stick it on my forehead, and put me in a sex shop,
I’m cheaper than all you can buy.
Thank you Wilberforce, you tried to make puppies in a pound less important than humankind in the hearts of humans unkind.
But those wear Prada, while HUUUUUUUMMMMAAANs starve to death, while humans are traded when they hit rock bottom, while water takes human life.
Well I just wanted to say that I’m for sale too, like my brothers and sisters who lost hope and sought hope in a lion’s den.
Well they say if you see an antelope running towards a lion pride, then wherever it was before must have had a Terminator – Alien – Predator hybrid…or worse.
So before I’m sold, this speck says to African “leaders”…:
Thank you <insert insult here>, You’re just doing what your predecessors did. Reducing our citizens to slavery through your silly greed. You’re the AIDS of our continent from which all kinds of ills take away our future…
You’re …mostly pathetic.
Ok, please buy me now, Paypal, Visa or just cash…399.99, please.
(c) nyonglema
Tears, tears, all I have to pour on where we have come due to the greed of the world powers, and the active participation by African leaders in making a bad situation even worse…God help us
On Addiction #slaveToPleasure
It pulls you as much as you pull it
It pulls you as much as you pull it.
You’re both master and slave to each other,
Satisfying your raster of cravings in destructive instants.
And in those instants when the cage feels sweeter,
You’re trapped further by some form of trance.
It pulls you as much as you pull it
It pulls you as much as you pull it.
You draw it towards you, feeling like an eagle
Patrolling your turf, oblivious to the nails sinking into
Your hands, as delusional you feel you’re in control.
You’re not. Each pull of yours meets Newton’s memento.
It pulls you as much as you pull it
But won’t push you even if you push it.
What ?! That’s the puzzle that rings the alarm:
You’re stuck in a draining flooded tub
And elusive are the objects which could grab your arm
And yank you out. Even when this beast was but a cub,
It pulled you much more than you pulled it
It’s pulling you much more than you can push it.
(c) Nyonglema
Wake Up #Africa #newEden
Don’t you just hate the incessant annoyance buzzing out of a cellphone?
Your eyes are shut, and dreams are in you, swaying and cuddling you
And there’s this syncopated harmony floating about like US drones,
Like you’re going to get hit. Like you shouldn’t be sleeping, but you,
You love it here. The real world’s harsh with things to fear, fears to bear
Bears in the office, officials plundering taxes, taxes to be paid,
Payments you are owed, Owen missing goals, Goals not getting nearer….
Near this cosy cushion of dreams, the cursed music is played
By transistors you’d bash but for the fact that you’ll have to pay
For the pain of being able to make a call again….
But that’s not what I’m talking about today. No way.
Who are you going to blame when it’s time to feel the pain?
Africa! AFRICA! Hey! AFRICA! It’s 6 a.m. and it’s pouring.
You’re stuck in a past of pain, perjury and mourning, looking further back
To dream of glory, gumption in days when you built stone storeys.
Those stories are history…..hello! ….Wake Up!!! Get out the sack
Generations boated in hordes, hoarded to shores where all fell apart
To generations hoarded on their own shores, robbed, tortured, more
To generations seeking for sure, for their brains have lost their heart,
And disconnected from self they float in hordes tormented and more,
Are your pedigree. Shall you stop to stare at the tripping stone there?
Shall you mourn the morning that brought mourning till it disappears
To some sugar candy mountain in purple pill colours, and hear
Psychedelic mushrooms hum soothing tunes into your crying ears?
Africa??? Who are you blaming now, while the shutters blind your view?
They enslaved you? You’d been doing it for ages and taught them too,
And caught and chose the ones to be sent off in balls and chains in twos
And forced them in exchange for glitter, clothes, status and booze.
They signed shady deals? Well not amongst themselves they didn’t!
Not like some shady deal CIA-hidden between Obama and Biden,
Or Paul and Phil. You were represented by the mice with hidden
Agenda at the cheese distribution party. So …..nope they didn’t.
Rather than mourn, and seek root in tradition tradition…tradition.
What’s tradition? And who said it was frozen in some distant time
Before others changed your clime? Your ancestor’s oral diction
Was altered, and clothing, and building and art and even clime
As you migrated from oasis to oasis, fleeing from wars and drought!
Tradition? That’s a 60s newspaper bashing Facebook for breaching
Tradition. Culture. I’m more for principles, which is deeper, without
Which our bearings are stuck in heavy rotation North East West South.
Rather than mourn, and seek root in tradition, reinvent your minds
Adapt, grow. Change is opportunity, and exclusion kills opportunity.
Reverse racism is two wrongs to a right, and no matter what fines
You would levy, exclusion is your energy spent to fix past iniquity,
But shouldn’t we be seizing that opportunity? Driving paradigm
Change in little and big ways, and saying to the plants in the garden:
It was tough, but soak it all up, learn from all and then you can design
A new way to live. Then call it culture, call it tradition. Call it Eden
(c) Nyonglema
Looking back at the 2000s #everythingGoes #libertinage
One thousand years ago…I think in 2000-something, or so,
The cure to any basal crave procured in dark alleys was to
Authorise it illico presto
As some means of control
But did anything get better?…well I don’t think so.
(c) Nyonglema
Not today #Gore #Slavery #Wilberforce #Racism
A Homo negus sits in a sardine can,
With many more like him, squashed together,
All in fetters, with 10kg dissuasion strapped
To them. He’s bound on a journey he hardly can
Comprehend, nor knows he where this pain goes
Despite avoiding capture before, while watching departure of many a brother:
He watched them go and never return to their homely coves.
A Homo negus sits in a sardine can,
Smothered by the stench of piss and soulful dirges,
Singing of shark food, once valiant men, women, sons, daughters.
These actually died, but all are bound to death in some living land
Where they’re less than dogs, they’re told, and everything goes.
Survivors of the murderous voyage are tools to quell carnal urges.
They’re no longer shackled in twos, but living in groups on life’s borders:
Whipped, weeping, weak, but forced to do exactly as they’re told.
A Homo negus gets pulled out of the sardine can,
Shackled in twos, they shuffle towards the waiting room
(A claustrophobe’s hell) each pressed against the other’s 3-month filth.
Through the narrow door the red sea screams with the blood of many a human
Who challenged this madness or got sick in these conditions.
He waits for the order to board the floating tomb.
But, he doesn’t know that today this trade will be killed;
That he shall go back home to heal, and heal a nation.
(c) Nyonglema
Jesus’s thoughts on Racism
Forget not Matthew 7: 3
What can you do with a speck?
Well, you can polish it and look good.
You can point it out, shout loud out let the world see how righteous you are and look good.
You can create a ban round the speck with others who saw the speck, and heck, you can change that part of the world and look good.
Even the stars can see the speck, no doubt
But is it really the Pareto choice with most clout?
I grew on tales of the evil white man with his long nose.
I grew reminded I'm a "nigger" and the whips will crack on my back, seize my foothold, banish my dreams, and tears pouring out my flat nose.
I grew on the black-washed history of the transatlantic slavery which tells of the buyer and torturer of my brothers for centuries and more.
I didn't hear of the North African slave trade, nor the Congo-Ghana one,
Nor the fact that "lenwa" in my village is a slave.
I didn't hear that Africans sold Africans for slavery but through Christian abolishment they earned better lives
I didn't hear that Eddie Murphy lives a better life than most Cameroonians, or that Lupita Nyongo won't have the same chances had she stayed on the continent.
I grew on the falsehood that a "nigger" like me cannot be racist
And that "White man, white man, white man with his long nose"
Is just fun as "Black man, black man, black man with his flat nose"
Would be.
Then I learnt that "nigger" is a bad word I learnt to rap to.
Then I learnt that I would be nothing, I would not get a job because of my skin colour.
Then I learnt that the white families who welcomed me didn't exist.
That my white friends were actually blacks in disguise...otherwise how could they be my friends?
And I shut my ears and eyes.
For while all were focusing on the speck of reparations
(Which should be paid only to children of slaves, by the buyers and
The African countries who committed the abomination of trading
Humans for whisky, guns and other silly gimmicks)
I'm looking at the plank of single parenthood,
Erosion of any viable belief system or value system
Widespread corruption, poor governance,
Electoral fraud, business fraud, educational fraud
Victim mentality and "reverse" racism...if such a word exists.
Racism is racism, and to see black and white and yellow and red and blue and purple on human skins is to be in a race on mushrooms.
I see one humanity, striving to make the present better than the past.
Striving to make this present prosperity pervasive and make it last.
(c) nyonglema
waghni 