Long, long ago
when, they say, we liv’d in huts,
in peace and in plenty we dwelt;
then came those ov’r-ripp’d pawpaws;
sermons, they preach’d
in their huge cathedrals of doom.
Just in our land,
In captivity, they held us –
and made us pass’d thro’
that Great Sea to their sugar plantation,
looking like a harsh-snowy-strange land.
Seeming not okay with this,
they landed with their politics,
dooming our aged culture as nefarious-inferior.
But we fought and fought ‘em
and had our real self.
Long, long aft’r our freedom,
a people, the Great Strugglers
from the Jewish family,
dwelling by the side or across the River Niger,
east of our homeland and omnipresent in all,
we engag’d in a civil brawl;
no victory, no vanquish we declaim,
but in our heart of hearts,
sorrows and tortures we have for ‘em:
depriv’d, we make ‘em;
detain’d, we shall get ‘em;
and desolat’d, shall their land be to ‘em;
for rebels they had been and want to be.
Freedom fight’rs they are:
the fringe of our land shall they be!
But we’re born to rule and reign in plenty.
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem