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ISSUE  SIX/2001

hopes  for  a society  that  will show  greater
understanding and tolerance for the many
disparities of  life.

However, the greatest point of similarity
between  Walker  and  Bandele  is  the
eagerness to be open about their lives. The
'literature of openness' is surely on ascent.
There is this feeling that after years of being
relegated  to  the  background  (through
ancient  and  modern  slaveries)  and
suffering  through  humiliation,  nothing
could  be  too  weighty  to  say.  Walker
describes  herself  as  a  "shameless  writer"
and  Bandele  does  not  feel  shy  in  talking
about what she is going through  in a bleab
but  hopeful  relationship. Perhaps because
both writers draw from  the same historical

experience, pain becomes a romance toward
clarity  for  them.  Bandele's  life  reflects
Walkers' shock  at a society  becoming  more
and  more  hostile and  lost.

Bandele's  memoir  is  so  intense  and
spontaneous,  perhaps  reflecting  her  deeply
internal  concern,  and  Walker  through
introspective  contemplations  serves  a
needling social commentary; yet something
of  one  reflects  in  the  other.  This  is possibly
due to the fact that, as most African-American
writers would agree, what they have become
can hardly be separated  from where they are
coming  from.  Importantly,  both  writers
subscribe  to  an  internal  courage  that  is
capable of always triumphing. GBS

A Great Feast of Return

BY OGAGA  IFOWODO

20-year  period  separated  the  publication  of  The Poet  Lied
from  the three new collections released  at the same time by
Odia Ofeimun on the auspicious occasion of his 50th birthday
celebrations. These were years burdened with the expectation
of more poetry and not many were prepared to acknowledge
that  after  The Poet Lied, Ofeimun  did.  in  fact,  publish  two
more collections: A Handle for the Flutist
(Update,  1987)  and  Under African  Skies
(Hornbill, 1991).  Perhaps,  understandably
so.  given  the  literary  excitement  and
polemical  furor  bearing  upon  the  release
and  quick withdrawal  from  circulation of
The Poet Liedby  Longman (London), and
given  the  fact  that  the  two  latter  titles
hardly  caused  fundamental  stirs  within
literary  waves  unlike  the  former.  It  is no
surprise,  therefore,  that  in  coming  out
finally from his deep silent rendezvous with
the Muse, echoes of  The Poet  Liedshou\d
be heard all over the new poems, especially
those collected  in Dreams at Work.

Many had adopted  every style of non-
combative  verbal  assault  possible  to  get
Ofeimun  to  publish  the  poems  he  was
famously  honing in the past two decades.
The more they tried, the faster his embrace
of silence. Despite — or shall we say, untiP.
— the intervention of his older compatriot
and  friend.  Wole Soyinfca.

In  the  Nobel  Laureate's  first  post-
Stockholm collection of poetry, Mandela s
Earth and  Other  Poems,  he  not  only
borrowed  the title of one of the poems in
The Poet — "My Corpuscles Don't Readily
Marry  Slogans"  —  in  his  own,  but  also
dedicated  the  171-line poem  to  Ofeimun.

Odia  Ofeimun.
DREAMS AT WORK
AND OTHER POEMS,
57pp.
A FEAST OF
RETURN/UNDER
AFRICAN SKIES.
66pp.

LONDON IETTER
AND OTHER POEMS,
64pp.,
Hornbill  House,
Lagos, 2000.

Glendora  Books Supplement

15

Essentially a poem in which Soyinfca.  finding
a unity of political and literary temperaments
with  his  younger  colleague,  sought  to
respond  to  sloganeering  revolutionaries,
especially the campus variety who  "dribbled
slogans a thousand safety/Miles away, holding
forth by the Staff Club swimming pools", and
who "midnight missed at the barricades" but
found  "snoring  sweetly  in  a  mistress'/Arms,
secured by. wage-slave proletariats", it began
with  a  typically  Soyinfcean  mischief  that  is
worth quoting  at some  length:

Sooner  plead a writer's block, a cramp.
Akaraba worked  by the envious.
enchantment
Cast by a beloved  siren, jealous of
That constant rival, Muse. Sooner  plead
A seven-year dream  of  leanness, the fat
to follow.
Plead a passing inhibition, overdose of
reality
That stuns the mind and  beggars lyric.

One  is tempted  to quote  the entire  first
stanza, but I would rather  take from  the last
four  but one  lines of the  poem:

But  if  phrase-mongers  have  indeed
usurped  the world.
And dreams come packaged,  handy like
a sausage roll.
The poet chooses: DANGER — DREAMS
AT WORK.
Never one to drop a challenge, Ofeimun
was stung out  of  the  akaraba spell that  had
seen  to those  lean years (only, seven  then!).

ISSUE SIX/2001

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Glendora Books Supplement

16

Quick  to  spot  a  title-giving  line,  he  in  turn
grabbed it for his response. And as if to prove
a  point,  ensured  his  is a  full  one  hundred-
and-one  line  longer.  Joy,  a  thousand  lines
more. I would say. if at last the lean years are
over! Predictably, he accepts the main reason
proffered  by  Soyinba  —  "an  overdose  of
reality that stuns the mind and beggars lyric"
—  and  this  forms  the  subject  of  the  first
movement  of  the  long  poem  in  Dreams.
"Some  wounds  cut  so  deep",  he  says,  "we
forget...  how to flow/Some  hunger grows so
steep/It cuts out  the sun/and  tabes away our
eyes..."

Indeed  the argument  in  self-justification
continues  into the  third  movement:  "in  the
heat  and  sweat  of  the  wrongs/that  become
our  fare  before  every  arrival/we  must  wait
for  the selves  trapped  in stone  to  awaben."
Finally,  he  goes  to  Ogun,  a  shared  patron-
god, who "waited till his anvil could hold the
purest fire" for divine explanation. The poem
ends  with  a  tribute-as-prayer  to Soyinba  in
the tenth  and  last movement  sub-titled  "Let
Them be Mad." Although there is no dateline
to it, it is easy to surmise that this was either
written, or radically re-written, in the days of
the  locust  when  Soyinba  had,  in  a  twist of
double irony, to once again "borrow seasons
of alien lands"; that  time of recent  memory
when  the  plainly  lunatic  certified  the  sane
mad.  "To pray  for you  now  in  this hourl/As
roads are turned bacbon themselves ... O let
there always be those/who call the guilty by
their  names/and  please  let  them  be  mad/if
we,  we are too sane to be counted."

The second  part  of  Dreams titled  Gods
and Tongues' has poems for Fela. "it was the
bnife  stucb in his bacb ... /his broben sax on
the  rubbish  heap/taught  the  musician  of
rattles and banter/to tabe the bitterleaf of his
song  to  the  soupmaher  ... /to  reworb  life's
croobed  timber';  Obafemi  Awolowo,  the
"patriarch  (who) asbed  for  joy,  naive/to  the
end in childlibe ploying/to raise tramps to the
height of avatars ... the dancer who became
our  forward-gaze";  Sheibh Abubabar Gumi.
who bnew "that no tongue could escape from
sin/nor  could  hearts  live  by  tongue  alone/
where  God  is one,  languages  many".  There
are  also  poems  for  the  late  Zimbabwean
writer  Dambudzo  Marachera,  who
"cocbroached  through parbs and  alleys./the
darh democracy of forgotten  undergrounds/
wishing there were no slogans to die for..  in
a world where the broadday whore/soon wins
Virgin Of The year Award': Che Guevara who
"preffered  to  be  reaped  far  from  altars
shrines  and  gravestones,  grooves calling  to
pilgrim's feet."  and  thought  it "far  better  to
be honoured by birds/flying with strips of his
song/to  fertilize  barren  acres",  as  well  as

Ortega  and  Vaclav  Havel  who  now  could
"lower  your  folded  sleeves/stiffen  your
collars; get used to well-bnotted  ties ... (and)
acbnowledge the million hearts flung at your
motorcade."

The third part,  "True Worship" raises the
question of what gods are truly deserving of
our  strongest  feelings  of  respect  and
admiration.  Personally.  I could  worship  his
"Oyin" of  the  first  poem,  "a  brittle  wonder
that  survives/the  eternal  rish of  poetry  ... /a
life  that  civil  faith/has  turned  into  a  hymn/
. ..simply woman  made joyous."

The last part. "Muafangejos  Kraal", which
came out of a poetic  intervention  in a  1991
Oxford  exhibition  of  linocuts  by  the  late
Namibian artist who is eponym of the poems,
is an elating experience that turns Ofeimun's
eye,  so fixed on the public space, onto himself
1 do not  thinb that  the rest of  the  poems
in that  intervention  live up to the beauty of
"No Way  to  Go",  admirably  captured  in a
wistful,  defiant  melancholy  where  the  poet
seems  to  be  saying  to  himself.  "You  are
(growing)  old  Father  Williams,  and  at  your
age ..." ("The  fog of sadness comes over/my
sense  of  songs,  my  bit  of  dreams",  wails
Ofeimun  at  the beginning).  This poem  does
to you what a good old blues tune  .  such as
Miles  Davis'  "Kind  of  Blue"  or  Satchmo's
rendition  of  WC.  Handy's  "Atlanta  Blues",
does. By the time one gets to the last lines. "I
seeb/vanes for  my guitar  to wrest  waves/for
my blood  to  bnow  its acre/and  be at  home
with  itself  again!",  one  is  tempted  to
immediately  tabe  the  road  leading  to  that
house of experience.

The  Muafangejo  poems  testify  to  the
unity of art, in striving to represent  much in
images  and  words:  Ofeimun's  ability  to
conjure  the  original  drawings  before  the
reader  denied  their  visual  advantage
connects  with  the  bindred  feeling  and
uncanny  insights  that  only  true  inspiration
can bestow. As homage to resilience. Dreams
is brilliant  in showing  how  truth  discerned
from  art  provides  the  mortar  that  binds  an
often quicb-to-succumb flesh to the spirit that
beeps dreams alive and  truly at worb.

From Ofeimun. we also have the second
life  of  Under African  Skies,  which  had  first
been  published  in  1991  under  the  same
Hornbill  House  imprint.  This  collection  is
born of a communal ethos of art going bacb
to  the  origin  of  time:  an  African  dance
ensemble  in  London  commissions  a  poet
(Ofeimun)  to write  poetry  to select  dances
telling  a  story  of  Africa  from  pre-historic
times till a  now  (then)  best  captured  in  the
state  of  unfreedom  that  was  South  Africa
before  May  1994.  Under  African  Shies  is
poetry-as-performance  written  for  the  live

ISSUE SIX/2001  •

stage, though  it can singularly be related to
as poetry, devoid of the theatrical.

The  collection  scours  the continent  to
distil tales^reaching from  the  golden age' of
earth-  mother  worship,  marking  an  epoch
resolutely opposed to blood sacrifice, to the
period of priest-rulers and divine kings which
was  also  the warrior  and  empire-building
epoch,  down  to the continental  agony of
slave  trade.  The pitfalls  of an  anti-colonial
struggle whose vision did not go beyond the
lowering  of  the  imperialist  flag  and the
hoisting of the loom-fresh  cloth of the newly
independent  nations,  find  good  treatment
here too. As poetry written for. and actually
performed  through a tour of 13 cities (twice
in London) in the UK in 1991. Under African
Skies  gives  meaning  to the  widely-held
notion  that  poetry,  mostly,  aspires  to the
condition of music/song.

thrusting 

If  Under  African  Skies  tells  a pan-
continental 
tale.  A  Feast  of  Return
concentrates its attention on South Africa as
a way of engaging the ravage attendant upon
the cradle of humanity, Africa. Here, through
the priestess of memory, a sort of chorus links
the visions of commoner  and king, warrior
and  housewife,  priest  and  supplicant.
Although written before the historic dawn of
May  1994, and  ending  therefore  with  the
refrain,  "when shall we arrive?", "when shall
we breast the warmth/of  homecoming", it is
clear that "the one song of many voices/
the  earth's
marrow/to  the  farthest  star"
which  the sojourner  yearned
for  came  to be lustily  sung at
last.  One 
that
distinguishes A Feast  from the
regular run of  verses on South
Africa  is  "Apartheid:  Mother
and  Child."  In it. an  African
mother's  love  courageously
nurtures  a  'mixed'  child, not
the product  of sexual  assault,
against the outrage of both the
chieftains  of  color  bar and
comrades  who  "sneered  at
my daughter  as if to say/go
throw  that  blighter  into the
gorge/...  or  how dare you/
flaunt  that  bastard  like  a
prize."

from 

poem 

With  London  Letter.
principally
Ofeimun 
interrogates  the  fortunes  of
people  and the cities
inhabit,  at
different  turns
a nd
tides,
through

they 

the eyes of an exile. Though,  "free from the
swarm  and  crush  of  Lagos/the  sweated
journey  turned  to a  fiasco/fiercer  than  the
wars  of  democracy",  he  nevertheless  sees
Lagos everywhere, none the least in  "fellow
countrymen  interpreting  Jim Crow/saving
London from  London's filth, sick city falling/
artlessly  beggaring  my city  by the lagoon"
(Lagos). No surprise  that  the refrain,  a self-
inflected  irony, is that of a popular  highlife
tune  which  sealed  in the public  mind  the
notion  of  Lagos  as  the  city  of  "so so
enjoyment." It therefore went in similar logic
that London had to be "so so enjoyment" as
well. The thanks for how this wasn't the case
goes mostly to Dame Thatcher; and even at
its  (London's)  low. Ofeimun's  countrymen
"knowing  that the pound  yields no stink at
dusk/after  the sweat  of day returns  to the
Thames"  still  seek  their  dreams  there.  T.S.
Eliot once refered to London as 'unreal city',
and while observing crowds flowing over the
London Bridge remarked on how he had not
thought  that  death  had undone  so  many'
London or Lagos, Ofeimun in London  Letter
seems to be saying, " I had not thought  that
lifehad  undone/can  undo so many!"

Just before the title poem is a short lyric,
incidentally titled "London", dedicated to Ben
Obri. This 'London' is a woman encountered
at a coffee  shop, and its perhaps an attempt
to temper  the long  grim  letter  immediately
following  that  urged  the placement  before
this of  the image of  an enchantress,  refered
to  simply as the blonde olokuri.  Somehow,
by the end of the volume, after the poem to
"Eko - my city by the lagoon" or  "Tripping
Central Bankers at Tinubu Square"; after the
self-exorcism over a son's inability to respond
to  his father's  "Come  home,  son" wishes
followed by a soul-trying absence at his (the
father's)  funeral,  and  "The Mother  of AH
Mischief", the last poem which speaks of the
amorality  of all sides  during  the  1995/96
American/Iraqi  Gulf  War. the imagery  that
persists  in  the  mind  is  that  of  a  wench.
London. Or how does one relate to the lines
where Ofeimun is "gulping every Renoir/that
memory  could  grant  as recompense",  or
where he lets "metaphors drop their  clothes
/to free the pure lust  (?!) that teased/the roof
of my. mouth with dryland" ?

While  realizing  his poetry  in  the  oral
performative mode energizing Under African
Skies/A Feast. Ofeimun seems to have found
the  oral  form  irresistible  even  when  his
subject  nudges  toward  a  different  mode;
hence, a repetitive mannerism and rhetorical
flourish  exerts  considerable  toll  on a  good
number of the poems. This is more  evident
in  London  Letter. For instance,  while  the
stylistic device of beginning the next  stanza

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ISSUE SIX/2001 

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with the last line of the preceding one essays
a  connecting  thread  in the more  narrative
"Ebo", the fact  that  this is often  so gives an
uneasy  feeling  of following  form  to a  fault;
though  in performance,  this  would  hardly
matter  if it beeps  the audience  focused on
the  tale  as a whole.  Moreso, one also  does
not  thinb  it comes off well  in lines such as:
"his  lorries  hurtling  down/down  to valley-
centre...",  "from  the world, the wider world
that  always  ... ". "of haggling  and hecbling.
hecbling  and  haggling"  ,  "matching  my
nomad's  regress  to the native's  progress/

matching  the  native's  progress  to  my
nomads  regress"  ("Gia^bone");  "its due. its
staggering due" ("Oxford  summer");  "as we
mabe  carnival,  a  hearty  carnival"  ("June
Around Us"), to cite a few.

I do not doubt  what  prosodic  uses  this
strategy can serve, but it is always at the cost
of  sharper,  crisper  lines  and  more  intense
imagery, not to mention  the subtlety  that a
greater  economy  of  words  assures.  This
unfortunately  leads to the lingering echo of
a tone, a monotone that is difficult  to get rid
of. GBS

The Likeness of An
Incomplete Masterpiece

BY ADEREMI  RAJI-OYELADE'

Memory is all: touchstone,  threat and guiding star.

IVE years after his death, the great American author comes alive,
assuredly  and textually  immortalized  in the publication  of a
second full-length  novel entitled Juneteenth. "Always in progress.
Ellison's worb may now find pause, not cessation but pause....",
so  concludes  John  E Callahan.  Ellison's  literary  editor,  in his
incisive  introduction  to the author's  long-awaited  narrative, a
worb  which  has  been  in  constant  and
peculiar progression over four decades until
its appearance  in the summer  of  1999.  The
expressed  notion  of  pause  rather  than
cessation's a subtle admission of the phoenix-
libe  creative  energies  generated  in the
'completion' of the text.

The story of the dynamic and inerasable
life of Ellisons Juneteenth  has taben on the
saga  of  myth.  It  is  perhaps  the  most
celebrated  worb-in-progress  in  American
literature that would span over four decades;
it is the only worb of fiction by a major writer
of  the  twentieth  century  that  would  be
literally  resuscitated  or wrested  from  the
fangs of fire which consumed over 360 pages
of  the original  manuscript;  and it  would
remain  for  a  long  time  to come  a  ready
material  for  literary  controversy,  an
uncompleted  narrative  rehabilitated  and
presented  in  part  as  an  organic  and
completed  novel  by the author's  literary
executor

Ellison started writing the post-Invisible
Afar? text in 1954 and had almost  completed
the  narrative  when  on November  29 1967,
his residence got burnt and with it a section
of the manuscript.  Between  1967 and 1977.
Ellison  presented  excerpts  from  the

Ralph  Ellison,
JUNETEENTH, Vintage
Books. New Ybrb,
2000, 400pp.

Glendora Books Supplement

manuscript  for  publication  in  literary
journals and magazines;  these  excerpts and
part of the original  manuscript  dating  bach
to 1960 (eight in all) were featured in The New
Yorker,  The Noble Savage, and The Quarterly
Review  of Literature. And for  twenty-seven
years  after  the  mysterious  fire  incident,
Ellison continued to re-imagine, reconceive,
and  re-write  his script  such  that  by March
1994 he had produced  over  two  thousand
pages  of  typescripts,  part  of  which  is now
bnown  as Juneteenth,  the second  novel, if
not the sequel to the author's  narratological
commitment  to the history,  memory  and
dream of the blacb persona in American life.
A prolonged  and postponed  composition.
Juneteenth  is the re-creation  of a  novelist
with  the soul  of a  musician,  a writer who
played  the trumpet  early,  studied  classical
music, worbed as a freelance  photographer
and became a virtuoso of jazz and the blues
tradition.

The  novel  revolves  around  Reverend
Alonzo "Daddy" Hicbman. a Southern  blacb
Baptist  minister,  and  Bliss,  his  formerly
beloved spiritual child who would leave him
to settle in Washington and live another  life
as  Senator  Adam  Sunraider.  Bliss, a  white
boy.  was  raised  by  the  minister  in  a
predominantly  blacb  community  and
church, and on the values of blacb  cultural
heritage  in  the  hope  of  mabing  him an
ambassador of blacbness. Sustained from the
interrogative  and dialogic  connections of
these  two characters,  the central  story of