Adazeh Ador-Ishama's Horn Poem by Tony Adah

It was a bullhorn
Curved in every manner
Its sound travelled
The echo ramifying every Achibie's ear.
Adazeh Ador-Ishama
Was a stout man
Who bore a hump
Beside the left side of his head
He was a fierce man
Who laid quietly in his hammock
Waiting for a page
With an errand from the king.

When he got the details
Of the message
He extracted the bullhorn
From the antelope skin bag
Hanging overhead looking
At his face
Poured some water into it
In the ritual to soften the sound.
He blared the bullhorn
He blared it always
For good or for bad

He blared it
When the D.O came
To inspect the bridge
Achibie built over Onyurang
He blared it
When our locust bean fruits
Ripped at Kotsor,
Our impatient immigrants
We gave a field to
At the price the divisional officer
Prescribed but they refused to pay.

He blared it
When spears, guns and cudgels
Were desired to keep the enemy at bay
And when hoes, knives and diggers
Were needed to
Change our footpaths into thoroughfares.

It was a klaxon call
For all taxpayers
To avail themselves
At the agent's house
To render their due
He blared it
When the witches gather
In a conference to wreck havoc
On the sleepy community
That Achibie was
On the day a reverend father
Visited Karu to put the first school
He blared it
To the astonishment
Of the Irish priest
And he was made
A community treasurer
Now that there is
Blaring of the bullhorn no more
The community tired
Of its youth lives on
The fines of evil
And on that side
It has made strides
Especially for those
Who Were still foetuses
In their mother's wombs.