Was hope here only when the Amazon queen Nzhinga
and Nehanda, the Mbuya, of Zimbabwe fought to shield us from slave ships?

Was pride gone after Yaa Asantewa addressed the chiefs
in that secret meeting in Kumasi?

Did the warmth of home die with Queen Kahina, when she wrestled
into the swords of the camel riding men?

Was leadership only when Shaka ruled over Zulu?
When Mansa Mussa ruled over Mali? Or when Askia ruled over Songhay?

As dark as the ages were, King Khufu built the pyramids
As dark as the ages were, a University stood in Timbuktu
As dark as the ages were, Imhotep out shone the moon with wisdom

Today shines like it was twin with the sun
yet we cannot see our way to a better tomorrow.

What has chased the once leading and liberal hill-gods away?
Was it the same thing that placed these curses on us?

Kwame Nkrumah chanted his incantations
Sacrifices were offered by Nnamdi Azikiwe.
Jullius Nyrere performed his rituals,
Patrice Lumumba cooked his concoctions
and the divinations of Nelson Mandela
have been great.

Indeed, our native Juju-men have tried their muscles
But the land is too sick for a few of them to heal,
Who will complement their works?

I lay helpless on the bare ground of our dark hut;
watching Omar Bongo’s men drag my father away;
six gun nozzles staring at him without a blink
Kabila’s soldiers came-And the last I heard of my mother
was a scream of sacred pain.
I woke up with a loud cry of dismay from this nightmare
breathing as heavily as though I had just run fromKinshasa to Kampala,
chased by bullets and machetes and clubs.
I closed my eyes to seduce the spirits of sleep;
to snooze into the African-Utopia and draw some strength
-to run from Harare to Addis Ababa
when the sun rose.
But I couldn’t find that fat city I hoped for;
Mugabe, Mobutu and Mengistu had ordered the
massacre of everything that once made it a dreamland
I woke up again, with a squeal; panting,
panting as though I had just seen the ghosts of
Idi Amin and Sani Abacha
It began to rain outside. It rains here everyday;
tears and blood dripping down roof tops
and gushing into gutters
Bullets have been lightning flashes, And thunder cries
have been the wails of a suffering people.
It was still very dark outside
But it’s been dark here for very long now
Some men have held day from breaking,
strong men indeed.
I am still in that dark hut wondering when help will come
- wondering if it will ever come.
I thought I heard OAU and UN soldiers coming
But no, they were footsteps of Laurent Nkunda's men,
marching towards my hut
with a commanding voice, screaming
- “Destroy everything!”

Life is beating the Ayara-Ekomo drum
and I am dancing like the priestess of the river
possessed by the mermaid spirit of Anansa
even the sun rises to applaud my passion
Fate has cooked for me- the black soup
I lick it with the zest of a starved child
I run from the statues of my negritude
that sing to me the songs of the spirits
and expect me to dance the dance of the dead
I run as far as I can under those hunting eyes
of the night, through the thicket of the gathering
spirits of the forest. I can fall to the ground
like a Yoruba manto salute the full moon
that illuminates my escape path
From time to time,
the daunting drum-beats of life blend with
the crying drums and wailing flutes of my native land
and the music of a sun-heated people fill my ears-
And like a funeral-dance in a wake-keeping
I am demanded to tap to the depressing melody
But I dance the dance of a god.

We are the Africans
We rose with the sun and fell with the rain,
Stood with the hills
And danced with the forest-
when life sang her song.

In the comfort of our huts and
thatch we sprung.

We are the Africans-
the paragons of nature-
Seemingly cursed by her grace;
yet we live- blessed by the sun.

We are the Africans
“Never hide behind the curtains”
Queen Kahina would say.
“Peacocks are always proud,
Lions are never afraid,
And eagles are strong.”

We are the Africans
Sing us a good song and we will dance to it by the fireside
Sit by us and we will sing you stories of spiders;
to your awe

We are the Africans
The leopard never looses its spots
So our baroness stays for ever in our curtain ebony laces-
However brutalized it may seem.

And we will always be the Africans
Seated at the peak of King Khufu’s pyramids in Giza-
singing- living- dreaming.

I lie there on that rat-shredded raffia mat,
my thoughts running through the bush paths
to meet my dreams at the bottom of the Iroko tree.

Full moon comes and goes
I still lie on that mat staring at agama lizards creeping
up and down the bamboo sticks that hold my mud hut up,
Hope sneaking away like smoke from the burning fire-woods
through the holes in the thatch roof of mother’s kitchen

I am like a tilapia fish roasting
on the wood of time In the heat of harmattan

I am deaf to the sounds of
talking drums and crying wooden flutes
that play me to our ancestors
in high notes on traditional clefs.
I am sightless to the heart melting sight of
naked pot-bellied children
laughing and playing in the mud

I push the burning fire-wood together under the steel tripod-stand
and splints of fire fly into the air like in a performance to lift my spirit

My dreams have uprooted the Iroko tree
but my reflection in the eyes of reality hasn’t changed,

I have learnt to chew with content
when boiled yam, dipped in palm oil meets with my watering tongue,

The man drinking palm wine and breaking kola nuts with
my father in his thatch roof hut after a long day on the yam farm
lights a picture of me painted on the walls of tomorrow

At mid night when the moon smiles down
And when we gather to sing and dance,

I dance until my hope is tired
and until my dreams lay down to sleep,
to sleep through that long and vibrant African night.