by Henry Emenike Anumudu

I.
On that dark and moonless night
I saw them…
Trample noiseless into cascades of derelict blocks
I heard them…
Beg and cry, whimper and moan
‘Twas fruitless, souls were thrown, like bags
Into dark empty wagons
I saw them…
And my heart thumped.
as the sound, rickety…rickety
tore, like a knife, the darkness of the night
I saw… and I heard

II.
Morn rose…
As the heartless sun trudged
Lazily to its post
I saw them…
As men cry, & women wailed; despair seething
Those dreadful men, cursed, and the souls hailed
‘Twas love; they were loved.

III.
I heard them…
A woman, round as bell, in mournful agony
Said: let us all stamp equity in the ways of all
I heard them…
A man, like a sheep, baakd
In culture’s name…’Tis bad
And another, a man like the first
Religion rules: ‘Tis wrong
…and silence fell, as the gavel
By a men’s hand descend…

IV.
The stirring silence…
A revulsion to sense
An affirmation of folly of good men
A machinery of the evil
But…
I who heard, who saw
…and is neither this nor that
Sayeth to the silence
“Hath thou no thoughts?”
I saw…
when man his culture built,
As he would a house
To keep the child, between her mother’s thighs, safe
But culture stood and watched
As the child was took and marred
I heard…
When religion in the breast of humanity
This word it engraved: LOVE! LOVE!

V.
Alas! What love remains?
Innocence is plundered!
Dignity of the little trodden!
O! Culture! Hast thou not failed in thy task?
The child far from its mother doth stray: lost!
O! Religare! Men take thee for folly & deceit
What thou hath wrought
Now fades in thy wake
O! Justice! shouldt thou not now rise?
And as equal ordain man &woman?

VI.
Alas…
All I said was naught
Against the silence of men revered
Thus, like a ghost I float’d
Still singing the whispers of reason.

Henry Emenike Anumudu is a Nigerian writer, “an avid literature enthusiast chasing after the wellspring of Eternal Truth.”

Mazi Emeka