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A Poem-Love In Toto

Wed, 26 Jan 2011 Source: Sakyi, Kwesi Atta

Love In Toto

Akonoba

(Love daughter)

I love you basabasa (bad)

Anapa bosuo, anapa wi

(Morning dew)

Ahomatea

(Tiny String)

Ma akoma mu tofe

(The sweet in my heart)

Shaped like a guitar

My morning star

Ashanti queen

Your grace is something to behold

I seek attention of your heart

Don’t give me a hurt

Saying no for an answer

Not to me, not to me

I have vomited you

(Grown love sick of you)

Come and vomit my mouth

(Kiss me)

Akonoba

Ahoofe obaasima

(Ideal beautiful lady)

Don’t bewitch me

With your wicked furtive glances

I see love lancing

And dancing on your cherubic cheeks

Black beauty

I love you basabasa

I love your awosowoso (quivering buttocks)

Which tremble like a guy in fits

Or water in a brass tray

Balanced on the head by a black beauty,

On her way from the river,

When I set my sights on you

I see a royal presence

Your comely eyes

Are those of a dove

They are pools hiding ancient love potion

These days, you are rarely seen,

Sometimes you hide behind the Mununkum (clouds)

And for a while,

My world is cast in utter gloom

Then from behind the darkness

You oblige us temporary with your regal radiance

That outshines the effulgence of seven suns,

Oh, edukromu nsuo (holy water)

Free me from love torture

And handcuff me as your prisoner

I shall willingly serve life sentence

In your courts

And be at your beck and call

Ashanti queen

Akonoba

Akonedi komfo (priest of Akonedi)

Come imprison me my jailor

Be my executrix cum executioner

Wont mind dying in your bosom

Then, like your pet opossum

I shall lick your dainty breasts

Before I am put to rest,

Then add me your prize hunter

To your priceless prizes on your counter

Fa me ye (take me do/apply me)

I love you in toto

I love you basabasa

Akonoba

Who am I

Who am I, son of a modest cocoa farmer

To propose love to Philosophy

Mother of high leanings and learning,

Eminent philosophers,

Likes of Socrates, Aristotle and Plato,

Even in their best intents and gorgeous garbs

Woefully failed in their entreaties

To espy a glimpse of your fairly form,

Oh, who then am I

To fathom the beauty of this Venusian Conundrum,

Philosophy, the quest of ages,

Nay, the zest of Sages,

Again, the confuser of nitwits and pages,

Oh, Father Confucius, come to my aid

Philosophy, your fair form

Frustrates and bemuses your Valentines

They surmise you a mother of controversies,

They conclude you were conceived

In contradistinctions and contradictions,

How then not to confuse your admirers

Who queue up to worship and proselyte

At your altar of sophistry

At the Eleunisian heights

Where initiates baptize

And dabble in the deep bellies

Of Aristotelian eudaemonism

And Socratic syncretism –

Neophytes evince glimpses of

Philosophical constructions,

Abstruse abstractions in intricate worded

Semantic complexities

There they imbibe Platonian absolute universals

And succumb to suckling Einstonian

Relativity at low velocity,

Oh, Philosophy, your tutorials

Too convoluted for a farmer’s son to unwrangle,

I’d rather die an unlettered classical folk

Then suffer morbid torture of eclectic elusives

Syllogisms and semantic elocutions,

Perhaps, Philosophy’s megawatts electrocutes

Poor souls like me,

What tortuous and amorous homilies and argumentation

Proselyting under your tutelage,

In the lofty courts of your majesty,

Queen of all the Olympian tripos –

Philosophy, political economy and mega mathematics

A poem

The shortest verse is the best

Put the rest to the test

They ramble on

Till they come to nest

A poem, a telegram-

Compact in its detail

It’s self-contained

It addresses the issue

Without wasting tissue

Sport on, its language is terse

Oh, how I love verses short in text

Apt they are

No contest

Sometimes, it depends

The theme and mood of the bard

May bud,

Out the window

Goes the words –

Concise, curt, succinct and terse,

In comes copious superfluity

A celebration of words

Till the issue is laid to rest

In no small unrest

Afcon 2010 – Ode to Togo

African Confederation Cup Competition in Angola,

Soccer glitch outside the playing pitch

2010,

Media hype, football fever in FIFA fiefdom

CAF raised it to fever pitch,

It ran the Togolese into a ditch,

Assassination of two delegates in a nasty glitch

2010,

Dark history year for Togo and African football,

To go or not to go,

Dilemma for Togo’s team,

After dastardly ambush and ambuscade

In Cabinda,

Oh what a tragedy to the Togo Team,

They lost their steam

Rebels rained bullets on their convoy

Dirty politics crossed the path of

Innocent soccer enthusiasts outside the playing pitch

A bloodbath in cold blood

Nasty Cabinda rebels

Acted cowardly to type,

Like castrated bulls,

They acted savagely like menstruating goons

Leaving blood behind their trail

They must in shame lick their tail

Adieu, Togo soccer delegates

Africa and the football world mourn your loss

May heaven’s dew moisten your grave with moss

The Mouth

An idle mouth will say things

Things need to be said

Talk the talk and free yourself

An idle mind, idle talk

The mouth has no reins

Where I come from,

They talk their talk

They talk the small gossip

An idle mouth will say things

They mind other people’s businesses,

Yes, your business is everyone’s business

People talk and talk

From morning till evening

From dawn to dusk

They chatter and jabber

Idling away the time,

Where there are few jobs

The mouth will not sleep hungry

It will talk and feed on gossip

In Ghana, where I hail from,

There are professional chatterboxes

Go to Makola Market in Accra,

It’s a big talking shop

They churn the rumours

To feed the grapevine,

Tune to the milieu FM stations,

There is chatter galore,

You’ll go deaf with the deafening din,

Info overload,

Accusations and counter accusations

There is no economy of words

They stretch the truth

To chat all day

It’s convivial and gay

Welcome to Ghana

Akasanoma

Kasapoolo

Our Elders

Damirifa due!

Our elders

They came to do some

Not the whole lot

They climbed mountains

They descended vales

All for our sake

They made us dwelling places

They gave us education

And fought for our freedom

Our elders

They came to do some

Not the whole lot

They did what it takes

And left us much in the stakes

You and I can see their legacy

Not in mansions nor treasures

But in the upright life

The ideals they imparted

The wisdom they guarded

The path they charted,

Yes, they came to do some

Not the whole lot but they did a lot

Our elders,

Damirifa due (rest in peace)

Oil Curse

In hunger Ghanaians hankered for oil find

No sooner was oil found

It turned an albatross of a kind

Our national character was in a bind

Greedy gluttons spoil to fill their purses

Onlookers rave and rant with curses

The oil looters range themselves for a brutal brawl

On which side will be nurse spouses,

Seeing it is the politicians and their

Thieving ilk in a tangle

They raise hullabaloo and politicize

Every wee issue

Issues better left to bud in their pregnancy

How I wish in my anguish

There was no oil find

To raise this media excitation

And incommodious commotion

Threatening like a fiendish incubus

Waiting to copulate over national corporeal

Edifices

What an oddity of an odious

Odium –

Oil commodity –

Bunkum!

ENDORSEMENT

Prosaic poems

Endorsed for your reading pleasure

Do so

At your relaxing leisure

Pieces you will enjoy beyond measure

In them lie

Generous gems and a treasure

Let yourself go

Without a seizure

The thrills will entice you without frills

Some pieces will sound shrill

But not to worry

Ride on and read on

Though some poignant points will prove peppery,

What is the point in agreeing with all the points?

After all, we all have different viewpoints

Essence of writing, to raise a kerfuffle

Continuous writers will raise controversy

So far as poets, essayists and novelists (PEN) abound

They’ll deliberately muddy waters and ruffle feathers

Some writing may prove supine and deemed

Gutterly vulgar

Yet, exactly what they want to opine,

You may raise the bar

But they think they’re above par,

Truth be told

Writers are gleeful to spar,

For the feedback to them is mind fodder

To chew on the cud

They enjoy titillating the udder

To maintain their own equilibrium and order

A copious flow of ink

To them is cherished milk

They care less

About those who are not their ilk

Smoothly as silk

They ride on and write on

Never outdone by the big guns,

Not even the Sunday Suns

Great Disappointment Story

And he came

Hoping she was a dame

And good enough to be tame

Alas, he went away lame

Low and lame in spirit

In the love game,

Yes, it was a great disappointment

He walked away worse than he came

Crestfallen, he concealed his shame

And reminisced,

‘What is in a name?

After all, dames are all the same

They’ll disappoint and guys will not be the same,

Even if they are calm and sane,

They can grow insane

Swollen and sullen-eyed,

He looked dour and sore

His spirits flagged

They could not soar

Every nectar and fruit tasted sour

Drenched by his tears and in sudden shock

He had experienced firsthand the rape of the lock

The boar had been gored by a silly sow

A billy goat had been bearded by a silly bitch

Both were headed for a hitch

And were dangerously careering into a ditch

Oh, what a love game full of glitch

Disappointed

Dismayed

Disaggregated

Dismembered

And disarmed by the rude shock

He walked away empty handed

The love he had nursed and nurtured

Was a sham and a mock

To him, the dame deserved a sjambok

For making him drink hemlock,

Before the midday sun

His love evaporated like mist,

Soon, he was on the run

Hunted and haunted by his own amorous failure;

She in turn, regretted and wished to be a nun,

None the worse for the fun,

In atonement, she fasted and will not touch a bun

The riddle of their love fiasco graduated into a pun

Till this day, unrivalled and unraveled by none

Only in years bygone,

It was Sophocles Antigone

Then, Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet,

All love duels in contralto duet

Yoruba Beauty

My yawo

Yawo dudu

Yawo okorii

Yawo gidi gonn ni

Oremi Pataki

You are my enamorata

Yoruba beauty exempli gratias

Come to me, my valentine

My own, come to me

The love inheritance of my elders

My love, one love, undivided love

Come to me

Yawo alagba

You vend to put food on the table

You are big market madam

I vote you President of all women

You are my President

Oh, yawo dudu

No love surpasses yours

Dance kokoro dance to me

To fire up my insatiable love

I want to gourmand you,

Everyday, I take communion from your altar

Yes, everyday at your love altar

Oh, administer to me the holy waters

To douse the mighty conflagration

Coursing like flaming petrol in my veins

Yawo dudu,

What have you done to me,

I cannot have enough of your love,

Come to me, my yawo

Dance to me, yawo dudu

I have not boarded

Citizens, I bring a case

Nothing to pacify my intestines

My abdomen is burning

My intestines are grinding

My intestines are rattling and melting

My hand has not knocked my mouth

Yes, yesterday I boarded up and slept

I woke up on an empty shell

I have not bitten into the baby of a corn grain

I have not bitten into pepper

I have not taken my hand from it

I have not grinded dough

I have not made dough

My hand has not reached my mouth

My stomach has ebbed

I have not pinched fish

I have not done myself well

I have not put my hand down

Water has not touched my mouth

I have not ground pepper

I have fed on air

In short,

I am hungry

That is how we Akans say it in Ghana

An Ideal

What is man but a fleeting breath

Our duty, to give the world our all

To muster our lot for upper call

Service first to our Creator

Then to all mankind

No objective ever so sublime –

Check all religious ideals

They do converge despite their clime

‘Do unto others what you would they do unto you’

This golden thread runs the gamut

Across the religious divide

It invites Hindu, Moslem, Buddhist,

Christian, Zoroastrian and all

To the great invite

Duty to the Supreme Deity

Duty to all

A universal constant

It applies to all sages

In time and space

Rather than wallow in the abyss of ignorance,

I will freely a Christian gladiator be,

Or gleefully gravitate to the Holy See

To don on a garb of a gated monk

Than sinfully sink and grovel in the quagmire

As an unrepentant punk

Dancing erotically to junky funk,

The latter’s upward soar they will flunk

And nosedive perilously into the broiling sea

And get sunk when drunk

In their sated intoxicant life

When they are bored, gored and their sins rife

No sin ever sinful

Than self-centred conceit

Only the sick in spirit

Kowtow at the altar of self love

And worship erroneously as they self destruct

To all intents

These kindred stand more naked

Even when lavishly clothed

In fine feathered satins and silks

Than the simple-at-heart

And penurious peasants

Who live in constant peril of material poverty,

Yet spiritually they are saints,

They sleep rough, half naked in the streets

These have their kind hearts clothed

By their good deeds and selfless acts

Check the facts, they have no fat

To suffer BP,

They fart freely in open air

They have a pact with nature,

Living tough in a compact, they are

Self contained,

Naturally, they live as they wish

Till they expire past their sell-by date

Upstairs, they go to queue at St Peter’s gate

Only Yesterday

Only yesterday,

Boys and girls were we,

We horse played and did hide and seek

Teenage girls’ boobs bobbed and weaved

Pandemonium reigned in the pants of teenage

Braggarts

Yes, only yesterday

Adulthood a dim and distant prospect

Oh, how time flies

It’s already today

It arrives too soon

Only yesterday,

We pooh-poohed growing old

Old people, we deemed skeptical and stupid

We could run, climb and do antics,

Only yesterday, we were lads and lasses

Brimming with youthful impetuosity and exuberance

Our utterances were brash

Our actions were rash

Impatience written all over us,

But today, only a day after,

Suddenly, abruptly,

Old age creeps in like a thief

Grey hair sprouts like silvery mushroom

In unlikely places

The young view us with suspicion

Too soon,

We are in the

Afternoon of our journey

Soon, the evening shadows arrive unannounced

Oh, only yesterday

The sun was at noon

But today, it casts

Its rays from a low angle

Today, too soon

We are elders

At centre stage

The limelight glows on our twilight

Like a sex thief

We are caught red handed pants down

A Poet’s Motto

A poem a day

Will keep you awake

In spirit and intellect

No need to surf the internet

Unless it’s poemhunter.com,

You cannot go astray

If you engage intellect

In liberal poetic pursuits

A poem a day

Will keep you out of mischief

You engage in self-cleansing

As you write and ride on,

Mental cogitation sends you to purgatory

To wean self from dross

And flush your mind of gloss

Of self aggrandizement,

Then like stained teeth,

You receive a floss

Bad things

Don’t say me bad things,

Where I come from,

Saying bad things is a taboo

Such things are better said in the public loo

It is believed the loo stench

From the pit latrine trench

Cleanses the spirit of bad sayings

Don’t say me bad things

The mouth that eats pepper and salt

Has power to curse,

Where I come from,

You will pay a goat fine

To the village Odikro (chief)

If you badmouth me

Odikro will call witnesses

As if to prove a thief

If found guilty

You will pay a fine

Of a goat, a chicken, a small fee

And a bottle of Akpeteshie (local gin)

Badmouths pay many fines

That’s why many are refined

In my village where I come from

They don’t say me bad things

If per chance I fall ill,

To the jujuman we shall go

The oracle will fish out a curse

Fixed on me by a badmouth,

To reverse the curse,

Sacrifices will be made to the gods

To expiate the malevolent badmouths

My brother, my sister

Badmouths are loudmouths

They can devour human flesh

My brother, my sister

That is our tradition,

Don’t say me bad things

Unlike me

On a sad note

I choose to write not

This is but a note

I don’t want to write a lot

Please take note

Don’t on me dote

I will put a dot

When the pot is hot

I will put a dot

When the pot is full

And I’m no fool

I mean what I say

I say what I mean

I am what I mean

I am not mean

That’s the worst part of me

I try to balance

To arrive at the mean

Let me sit my somewhere

I see people go

I see people come

Is there anything happening hereabouts or thereabouts?

Oh, let me sit my somewhere,

It’s no business of mine

To nosepoke into fires in the hearth

In other people’s homes,

That’s bad manners, bad manners

So we’ve been told,

They could be roasting a toad

Or they could be smoking a roach

But then, none of my business to encroach

Oh, let me sit my somewhere

Let me sit my somewhere

But the scent from a burning toad

Wafting the air just across the road

Could be sickening,

Oh, my belly bottom is retching

And ready to implode

I fear my belly will cave in if I throw

So nobody can tell me something?

Here I am, sitting my somewhere

I see them go to the Airport

To and fro

They go

To and fro

They come

Just like visitations to the hospital

Yet, there is no dokita (doctor) around

Nor do norses (nurses) abound

I see strange strangers

I see weird ladies in fine laces

Crime is writ 3D

On their faces

I smell a rat cooking in a cauldron,

Or could it be a python simmering

In a gargantuan African cooking pot

Strange scents evoke fanciful imaginings

Of the goings-on and the goings-under

So, nobody will say me something,

Anything juicy to quench my thirsty curiosity,

But I get Krokro eyes oh,

And I get pin-pricked ears oh,

Only my mouth fit shut like a clam

To and fro

Fro and to,

They play seesaw with their entrée

And exit;

Like the tides at the shore

Ebb and flow,

They reap but do not sow;

To the Airport they go to and fro

But these don’t work at Airport

Neither do they work anywhere,

Yet they drive German posh cars,

Eat Russian caviar, smoke Havana cigar

Drink French cognac, Scotch Whisky

And Italian wine

They eat Hungarian sausage

They strut about with lazy bone girls,

Girls who dunno how to get a life

They fit no sane man’s criteria for a wife

He-men adorn their bodies

With satanic tattoos

They wear expensive garb and habiliments

Fit for kings and queens

Yet, their dressing taste is a distaste –

Chains, rings, jewellery of sorts

Adorn their ears, noses, necks, fingers,

Perhaps, toes, navels and genitalia,

Above this riot,

The never missing high society perfumes

Suffuse and gag the air

They shit expensive shit oh, Oga

Yet they jealous my simpleton style

My brother, my sister,

Nowhere cool oh,

I bet, they envy my unsung stool!

Today is party day

They blare funky rap music at the loudest

The way it happens all over the city

When there are funerals

So, are they partying or holding

Their own funereal funerals

Before d-day when the storm breaks?

They dance the dance of the uneasy rich

They fake fake happiness

Oh, my brother, my sister

Their inside no cool at all, at all oh

They drive on the suicidal fast lane of life

Abi, but me, I dey my corner oh,

Let me sit my somewhere

One day, yes it took only a day

Their secret leapt out of the gate

A kid brought from up country

Spilt the beans

It was like a bird’s whisper

‘You know, they cook magic powder

Day and night

They sell to throwers and couriers

At Kotoka Airport perimeter in Accra

We count dollars in wads and rolls,

Oh, you can smell the dough in

Our house …….

Blah, blah, black sheep …..

Oh, so magic powder is their secret

Cocaine they call it?

My brother, my sister

Let me sit my somewhere

No where cool oh

Cocaine is cooking and brewing a storm

When cooled,

They will eat and shit,

The scent will create a stench

Soon, they will swoon and ‘quench’

With BNI and FBI on their trail

They will shrink and desist from drinks,

Tails will shrink between their legs

They will gnaw at their fingernails

But me, they think I’m a snail,

Yet we all go reach our destinations oh

Oga, let me sit my somewhere oh

Where I see them go and come

To and fro, to and fro

With my own krokro eyes oh,

Oga, no where cool,

Let me sit my somewhere

I don’t like myself trouble oh

I’m no son of a gun oh’

Nna them be! (It is they who are)

Speed Limits

Reach late

Don’t be the late

It’s better to be late

Than the late to be

Put less joy

On accelerator plate

Pump less your right foot

You won’t be late

Better late an appointment

Than an appointment with death,

Speed kills

But it thrills

Careless driving can rill

Don’t hesitate

Observe speed limits

Don’t a road menace be

Save some savvy sense on the road

Save yourself a messy load

Other road users may accuse

Be in your road sense

The road will be less tense

Good sense, drive safe and pense

Fear Man

Fear you man’s guile

He is vile

His every move interpret a wile

Be on your guard all the while

Life’s journey, a long mile

Never despair, conquer with smile

Thereon, you will triumph over the pile

False Accusers

False liars

They lie standing up

They lie lying down

In falsehood they lay the charge

It looms large

They seem to be in charge

You stand small, heavily accused

Your innocence, no one believes

False liars

False accusers

Sons and daughters of Satan

They are the guilty

You are their guilt

They better quit

Or they’ll wilt

Before the shining throne of wit

False accusers will tumble into their own pit

Then they will have no bit

To bite into

In the dense den of their damnable desecration,

Then, only then,

I will seek my own consecration

Columnist: Sakyi, Kwesi Atta