Songs Of Deltans Poem by Arnee Akpan

Songs of Deltans,
Voices of elders,
Voices of the crowd struggling to be loud
With prayers to be heard,
Songs not so rhythmic
Yet so epidemic
Voices crying for freedom
Freedom from Sodom.


We are the voices from the South,
Voices of the land.
We till our yards,
We produce the Treasury
We promote the map
Yet we lose,
You dry up our farmlands
In the name of exploring the economy.


In the dry season,
Our sweat wets the ground
Our shadows saves the land from too much sunlight
We serve our homeland like the encyclopedic word ‘Patriotism' directs
Yet our skins decay.



In the rainy season,
Our feet gets wet
Our poor huts are brought down by the mighty hands of rain,
Our souls drenched with cold tormenting our feeble flesh.
Our little fruits of survival are washed off by the hands of the gods right before our eyes,
Songs of Deltans
Choruses from the South.


In the harmattan,
Our bones become emaciated,
Our feet cracks like the anthill
Our soul's battery runs low,
We try to cover our skins with linens
While the lords cover themselves with wool,
The wind from the Atlantic rejects us,
Songs of Deltans
Choruses from the South.



Songs of Deltans,
Cries of the Elders,
Voices of the youths,
Wishes of those yet to be born,
Voices of the weak crying to be strong,
Voices of the poor begging for alms,
Verses of those dwelling in the desert with pastures.
The god's have turned their backs against us abandoning us to fate,
The throne had dejected us even though we own the gold.


Songs of Deltans,
Verses beckoning for hope,
Verses beckoning for change,
Bridges of freedom
Music of the revolutionary from the South
Choruses from the South
Songs of Deltans.