**By Akadu Ntiriwa Mensema, Ph. D.
Vu
Vuu
Vuuu
Vuuuuu
Ah! Vu Vu Zee La Africa
Oh! Vuvuzela Africa
You are here to stay
Historic pristine horn
Of Xhosa, Zulu, Tshwane
You have always been with us
You have overpowered the West
You resonate immaculate sounds
Inspiring
Summoning
Commanding
Clarifying resonance
Soaring eloquence of music
Twinkling musical possession
Of evocative appreciation
Music that commands the wind
Music that holds the sun still
Music that brightens the moon
Music that horizons Africa
Ah! Vu Vu Zee La Africa
Faultless jingle
Married to soothing echoes
The horn of old Africa
Welcomes all to the new Africa
Via pathways of South Africa
Vu
Vuu
Vuuu
Vuuuuu
Ah! Vu Vu Zee La
Your soothing silhouetting music
Soothing music has drowned the West
Western noise-making
Noise that seeks to demonize Africans
Demonize African soothing tunes
Don’t mind Africa’s siblings
Arrogant siblings of hegemony
They have their ice hockey
Where noise cheers violence
Where violence cheers noise
Where blood is a signifier victory
They have their football
Where noise cheers concussions
Cheer-leaders of female nudity
They have their soccer games
Where punk-drunks slaughter noise
Cacophonic racists cheer whiteness
They have bull-running games
Where noise cheers gory bloodiness
Cacophonic NOISE
They call it CIVILIZED noise
Vu
Vuuu
Vu Vu Zee La
Oh! Vuvuzela
You have drowned the Western noise
Western cacophonic noise-making
Africa’s imperious siblings
Always have home-grown ideas
Ideas that marginalize Africans
Hegemonic marginalization
Of our religions
Our languages, epistemology
Of our names
Our worldviews, ontology
Of our social formations
Our gendering, sexualities
Of our statehood, statecraft
Our foods, oxygen
Of our sun
Our blackness
Anything of African origin
Encapsulated in Western imaginings
Of negativist frameworks
Africa our Africa
Mother Africa of vuvuzela
Our Africa’s noble calling
Of soothing music
From South Africa
Heard from vuvuzela
Dazzling the world
Is noise in Westernized ears
Of Africa’s arrogant siblings
Vu
Vuu
Vuuu
Vu Vu Zee La
Vuvuzela
Privileged West
In the garb of hegemony
Of inventing everything
Of wishing to have their way
Africans stand firm
Stand, Africans stand firm
Let us blow our Vuvuzela
Vu Vu Vu Zeee Laaaaaaaaa
Has overpowered their noise-making
Cacophonic Western noise-making
Of our bane of darkness
Vu Vu Vu Zeee Laaaaaaaaa
Our Africa has emerged
Africa emerged to be heard
To make healing music
To make empowering music
Ah! Vu Vu Vu Zeee Laaaaaaaaa
*Akadu N. Mensema, Ph. D., is a nationalist Denkyira beauty. She is a trained oral
historian cum sociologist and Professor in the USA. She lives in Pennsylvania with
her great mentor and teaches Africa-area studies at a college in Maryland. In her
pastime, she writes what critics have called “populist hyperbolic, satirical”
poetry. She can be reached at akadumensema@yahoo.com
