Homo Sapiens Africanus
I am old
enough to ask questions,
though some
say,
too young
to understand the answers, of
the unbalanced
equation of our past and our present
where one
and one make zero.
Everything
has changed
but the
equation of life,
scribbled
on the walls
of Rift
valley caves
with a sum
total of zero.
Zero,
held
captive
in the
primordial darkness
of vacuum
of the “why” of creation.
Darwin saw a tree,
trunk, branches
and leaves, no roots,
Idaltu
sitting on a branch
Lucy, an
arm’s length above.
Some say
all was an accident,
atomic and
molecular wars in dark depths,
amino acids
navy in slimy submarines,
conquering
frontiers, intermarrying,
mating in
the ecstasy of occasional lightning
finally
marching triumphant
out of
water to dry land.
II. Homo
sapiens africanus
Dark depths
was the venue of the beginning
of the
continuum of darkness,
one
constant in our crooked equation.
Locked in
the safety of zero,
nothing
mattered, nothing matters,
an accident
cannot be sacred,
vacuum
abhors sanctity.
III. Homo sapiens africanus
“But I must own, to
the shame of my own countrymen, that I was first kidnapped and betrayed by some
of my own complexion, who were the first cause of my exile, and slavery……” Ottobah Cugoano, Narrative of the
Enslavement of a Native of Africa (1787)
Close to
where it all started,
Clouds of
darkness,
stamped
envelopes of the beginning
have still
not lifted.
Fifteen
slaves exchanged for one horse,
twenty
Lucys for one donkey
just a
stone throw from the Rift valley,
all
accidents of dark depths.
Ten
Olaudahs for a mirror,
twenty
Ottobahs for gunpowder,
offsprings
of accidents could not be sacred,
at least
not in these dark depths.
Abomey’s
Ghezo made bricks
with blood
of captives and slaves
Idi Amin
drenched the valley with rain of blood,
parallel
constants of same equation
time is the
only variable in the algebra of our mind.
From Arabs we
took a horse for twenty slaves
from the
Berbers, a donkey for ten children,
with
Europeans we traded fifty of us
for glass
beads and mirrors.
Locked in
elemental reactions,
Lucy pulled
Idaltu,
Idaltu
dragged Lucy off the Darwinian tree
to the
bottom, nearer the amino acids.
Hegel
sighed,
“..as we see them at this day,
so they have always been”
locked in
the darkness of moral vacuum,
where a
herbivore had more value than fifteen of them.
We were
taught to point fingers
that the
buyers were at fault,
the sellers
were doing business
in
legitimate moral darkness.
We were
told that
our
brothers were dehumanized
by the
buyers on the ships,
in the
plantations, on the streets.
But hear Alexander Falcolnbridge in 1788,
“When the Negroes whom
the black traders have to dispose of are shown to the European purchasers, they
first examine them………if they have been afflicted in any manner… they are
rejected. The traders frequently beat those Negroes which are objected to by
the captains. Instances have happened that the traders, when any of their
Negroes have been objected to have instantly beheaded them in the sight of the
captain”.
In the
safety of our envelope of darkness
We point
fingers at the grey shade of our actions.
Darkness
now sits at the judgement of the shade.
IV. Homo sapiens africanus
Is water thicker than African Blood?
Parallels
of the same equation
With sum
total of zero morals and ethics,
Geometric
circles of déjavu, where
Time is the
only variable
African
slave traders,
Idi Amin
Dada,
Jean-Bedel Bokassa,
Marcias Nguema,
Mobutu Sese
Seko,
Foday
Sankoh,
Charles
Taylor,
True
guardians of the Abomey’s throne.
V. Homo sapiens africanus
Everyone but us is responsible ……
Everyone
but us is responsible
for the
fall from the branch
homo
sapiens sapiens at the top
to the
bottom of the tree, as
homo sapiens
africanus auto destructus
Pyramids of
heads,
lakes of
blood, we offered as transport
for others
to climb even higher on the tree, as
we squirm
as nature’s ordained victims and
clutch at
primordial amino acids
to see us
through self inflicted curses
of Arab
slave traders,
European
slave merchants,
colonialism,
socialism,
capitalism,
democracy,
wars,
atrocities,
corruption,
kleptocracy,
child
soldiers,
modern day
slavery,
World bank,
International
Monetary fund,
their
adjustments of structures
and readjustments
of non structures.
VI. Homo sapiens africanus
they all got it wrong from Negritude to NEPAD
Racism is a
legacy of a moral judgement,
a
condemnation of our equation,
lack
of value of our own kin,
our choice
to remain in primordial darkness
of absence
of good and evil
We sold, we
sell,
We killed,
we kill,
We maimed,
we maim,
We
functioned in moral darkness,
We thrive
in moral vacuum.
Within the
safety of our envelope,
We grope
for direction in everything,
offshoots
or negations of others’ way of life
Negritude,
Ethnophilosophy,
Hermeneutics,
Traditional
religion
Western and
Oriental religions.
African Union,
NEPAD,
ECOWAS,
SADC.
We ignore
the light of moral principles
of “do not do unto others,
what you would not want done to you.”
For pittances,
we have become Judas of our own race!
VII. Homo sapiens africanus
Africa – a case of entropy.
From order
to disorder
branch to
the bottom,
amino acids
in constant motion,
creation
recreated in dark vacuum,
deregulated
Adamus Africanus abandons his shores,
scuttles
out of water in distant lands,
dripping
deregulation on well nurtured lawns,
sowing
heroine, hashish,
reaping
scorn, abuse, jail, rejection.
VIII. Homo sapiens africanus
We are
natural dancers
we dance in
abandon
to any
rhythm,
others’
music.
When the
drums beat
”catch slaves and sell to us”,
We catch
and sell,
We dance.
The flute
pipes
“sell us
your land”
we gyrate
and sell,
We dance.
The trumpet
blasts
“socialism”
we stamp
our feet and go red,
We dance.
The violin
strings
“capitalism”
we shake
our bodies waving flags,
We dance.
The guitar
strums
“kill your
neighbours”
we stump in
frenzy, hack heads and arms
We dance.
The piano
mourns
“develop
yourselves”
we twist,
swing and ta-NGO
We dance.
The
orchestra plays,
Market
economy, deregulation, globalisation, democracy,
We howl,
jump in delirium,
We dance.
We have no
music,
we are
natural dancers
to the
music of others.
From Children of Signatures By Abimbola Lagunju
