The Banished Poem by ANTHONY ANIGBATA

THE BANISHED

Sent out of my fathers' land
I shall not return home, where their plinth stand.
But plod down to the ford
Wandering into unknown territories
Though the dawn chill fears, I shall wait
Till the night hide the hulk from the restive eyes
And pick my properties forth
For an endless sojourn
I shall sit on the strangers' fell
Grinding teeth of agony and tears,
I will be drowned in wish and longing
To someday not so far, dwell back on my heir loom
Still as an heir, riding the smiles of bliss
But till then here in hiding I shall be
Bearing the hotness of the sun,
The harshness of the harmattan
The raging gale and the stale life; yet I shall not go back
The root is out of the soil, the branch grafted from the bore
And may forever remain, solitary one rejected by the rest.
Now I shall learn to dance to the new noxious tones
Of life and forget the appealing home tones.
Do forget me now and till your farms
Burying the bole in that sward
For the sail is finally out of its shell
And may never return, where love and care
I once embraced.