TOWN CRIER

Benjamin Onuze

Benjamin Onuze

Thursday 29 September 2022

Gbom! Gbom!! Gbom!!!

Resounding clamor and thunderstorm

All morning jingle wake; dusk’s lullaby

As this hamlet is bathed in silence

Dead tranquility; like the spirits tread the night,

Whence tell the tale of a lost land.

When this evening, the dull sun

Who ushers the town crier

With gongs clamped; village mouthpiece

‘Tell the truth of night committee’

Saddened with your resonating tears

Of ways bashed in the tethering soil.

Iti mmanwu! Masked gods

Tell of reverence and adulation gone

Of gods profaned by our very hands

Of stashed artifacts of Ijele quiescent,

Robbed of dignity and worthiness

And buried in our rigid hearts.

Egwu Onwa! The folk stride

Lament of Children locked behind bars

As the full moon sways the eerie night

With no grey by her fireside

Or kids to warm the cold squares

Sorrowful, each full moon wanes in angst.

Thin dry land forsaken of old ways

Wail of life lost in your quest

As your sprout wings abroad

And color your beginnings in mud,

When these days haunt you

I shall tell of the town criers lament.