*Tony Cemaluk Egbuonu

Nkea na amamu ahu jijijiji,
Ikedo mu na nmazi uzo di
n'okpulu ugbo mmili anyim,
...

PROMISE not pounded yam when you can't
pound pounded yam; worst, under oath,
when you can, but compromise instead to pound cocoyam.
...

The children were busy all morning
picking the African pears he knocked down.

Nze lachaa otogbo odu ya —
...

We didn't fight.
We just died.

I died in you.
...

Age Four

Standing bicycle.
*krrrr krrrr* backwards.
...

Sobbing, I went to meet my Dad,
Chief EzeMalukwuo,
in the in-house stall where he was shelving goods.
He had just come back from Onitsha.
...

My temperamental disposition manifested early
and my dad, Chief Ezemalukwuo Nwoye Egbuonu cut it in the bud.

Whenever it manifested my dad would cool me down.
...

After the long storm.

At the height of a rite of passage,
he sounded the ancestral horn.
...

The war just ended.

At the peak of a great cultural initiation celebration,
he brought forth his father's voice —
...

My father was a subsistence farmer. Mounds were ready.
We were to plant yams.

My task was to prepare Ukpo -
...

Mounds were ready for yam.
A child made Ukpo from spined leaves.

A titled elder arrived.
...

The reception, really receptive,
As marketing public relation, was repetitive,
To be solely so; so the trick was to ignore all,
As an ignorant, even the sonorous singing ringing tone,
...

N'okpuru ụgbọ Mmiri

Ọ na-ama m oke egwu n'ezie,
na-ekekọta m na rudder a.
...

However this load, it is an overload,
Whenever there's overloading, there's an urge to offload.
I will rather go off the road,
...

Sincerity reaffirmed, all
In its ramifications,
Verily, knowing and meeting
As the Yuletide was young.
...

THANK YOU,
for all that we shared.
The irrationally-laden meeting,
dry-cleaned with humble hearts.
...

LIKE THIS, before they came,
Shattering, we were chartered,
Chattering; chanting choruses and songs,
From souls for souls, by souls, to souls.
...

Son begets father; daughter, mother.
Doesn't foetus beget all?
Rest in peace, foetus
...

The children were busy all morning
picking the fruit the man knocked down.

There is a saying —
...

Coming back from a school visit to a neighboring town,
still dressed like a rascal —
dark glasses on,
face cap turned to the back,
...