Our Fated Journey Poem by Adookorn Auaduma

Take us to Europe and America -
the civilise enclosure of slavery,
though nature lives thousand miles away,
oppression lashes with gentle whip -
following at the heel of low tide corruption.

Fly us away from the burrow of wild pig,
though nature lives in the courtyard -
oppression lashes with the whip of barbwire,
in concert with high tide corruption.

Salked from our fated pen, let's porter
the stake of disdain - bathe affluent clays
on bereft couch, and stack them in the morgue
to earn a dollar, and redeem our torn souls -

Also our broken fishing pirogue, and hook,
our net, and the fishes that smoke the air
of extinction - crab, periwinkle, oyster and all -
nature's own in the creel of our life.

Shall we munch or swallow our food -
cassava-fufu or pounded yam served
with balsam leaf, or prewinkle and oyster?

We will open the book of lost memory
to see the fossils of Mom and Dad,
and will embalm their bones with balsam leaf;
even if, we are mistaken for the primitive ape.