A Pedigree of Me
Hundreds of moons saw me in silence,
Echoed past my shadow that
Blurred the reflection of the past.
And I sang that song again. Again.
Of what slammed my lips
To forget these ancestral chains.
My voice like shallow water
Running over stones
Babbled into the fog of reality.
Went pleading to tear my reminiscence
Off the Zik of Africa,
Off Balewa,
Off Awolowo,
The forebears, who remind me
Of my provenance.
But the burden of my breed begs
My conscience for clearness.
“I was a hero from birth
And my christening was
A collocation of cultures.”
So I long to walk back to that
Simple anchorage of freedom.
Long to rise singing. Again.
Of a history left to wander
In the mouths of strangers.
Of a memory fading like
The skin of a grizzled gecko.
SHE had lived (it was I),
To carve an image of me.
Left her bloom in the past.
So, back I peered. Dig,
To make it real again.
That’s my pedigree.
—–
Poem: Clement Abayomi
Image: Lynn Greyling Pixabay remixed