Poet of the week from Cameroon: Mbella Sonne Dipoko

In celebration of Cameroon's Independence Day (20 May 1972) my poet of the week is Mbella Sonne Dipoko.  I have provided a slew of links that can give you more background on his very interesting and colorful life.  I think that the poem that I have featured below aptly captures the spirit of the man whose life spanned the breadth of the human experience: poet, writer, chieftain, mayor, rebel and thinker.

NOTE: When I feature these poems I am not cutting and pasting them from anywhere since most of them aren't readily available on the web.   Instead I am retyping (transcribing) them from a book of poetry.  Initially this was tedious, but I have found that I enjoy it now.  Typing out the words, the stanzas, the periods, the capital letters, the commas, illuminates the poet's intent and state of mind for me. 

*From what I can tell, Dipoko wrote this poem in English.  I intend to translate it into French at a later date.

A Poem of Villeneuve St. Georges

(for M-C)

I am tempted to think of you

Now that I have grown old

And date my sadness

To the madness of your love.

All those flowers you hung

On my gate

All those flowers the wind blew

On the snow!

Why must I remember them now

And recall you calling me

Like a screech-owl

While I watched you

Through the window-pane

And the moon was over the Seine

And Africa was far away

And you were calling

And then crying

In the snow of exile

And the neighbor’s dog barking as if bored

By the excesses of your tenderness?

When I came down for you

And opened the gate

Cursing the cold of your hand

You always went and stood

Under the poplars of the river Yerres

At the bottom of the garden

Silently watching its Seine-bound waters;

And the moon might take to the clouds

Casting a vast shadow

That sometimes seemed to reach our hearts.

And then following me upstairs

You stopped a while on the balcony

As high as which the vines of the garden grew

With those grapes which had survived

The end of the summer

You picked a few grapes

Which we ate

I remember their taste

Which was that of our kisses.

And then in the room

You in such a hurry to undress

And you always brought

A white and a black candle which you lit.

Their flames were the same colour

Of the fire glowing in the grate

And you were no longer white

You were brown

By the light of the fires of love

At midnight

Years ago.

Dipoko was born in 1936 at Mungo, Cameroon.  He left Cameroon for Paris in 1960 and lived there for about 25 years (I think); he died in Tiko, Cameroon in 2009 .  He published two novels: A Few Nights and Days and Because of Women.  He also published a book of his poetry entitled Black and White in Love.  From what I have been able to research, he was also a controversial figure in his service as a mayor in Cameroon (in Tiko) under the CPDM after previously denouncing authoritarianism.

LINKS:

FUUO Poets of the Week Compilation

Wikipedia Dipoko entry http://anglocamlit.blogspot.com/2007/11/profile-mbella-sonne-dipoko.html

http://www.dibussi.com/2006/06/mbella_sonne_di.html
http://www.joyceash.com/2009/12/mbella-sonne-dipoko-dies-at-73.html
http://www.palapalamagazine.com/2009/12/in-memoriam-mbella-sonne-dipoko.html
http://www.peuplesawa.com/fr/bnvip.php?prid=4085&wid=2
FUUO Happy Birthday Cameroon Post

Malagasy poet Rabearivelo's "Lunar Images" from 'Almost Dreams' (Saiky-Nofy)

Poem of the week from Malagasy poet Rabearivelo's "Lunar Images" from 'Almost Dreams' (Saiky-Nofy)

Lunar Images (Sarisarim-Bolona)

Moonlight, moonlight--what then?

Do not drink too much of the milk that drips
from the teats of this savage one-eyed dog
baying into the wild lands of the sky
as though to summon from within the desert of the night
its countless offspring
opening their eyes: myriads of stars

Moonlight, moonlight--what then?

The wind itself is milky,
which shakes the sculpted shadows
on the earth
and multiplies the number of visible
souls of all things
that seem to flee the baying--silent
but resounding everywhere

Moonlight, moonlight--what then?

Do you see those gentle birds
that grow within the spectral landscape?
They feed on shadow,
they peck at night.
What will they fill their crops
when the stalks of rice and corn
carried off by the cocks
become songs in them?

Moonlight, moonlight--what then?

I am no longer young enough
to seek a lunar sister outside
after the games of little girls:
I will hold my children on my lap until they fall asleep,
and there are many books to be read with my wife
until the moon changes
and becomes itself for us
while waiting for the dawn
that will overtake us on the shores of sleep.

Other Madagascar Posts:
"Fruits" from Rabearivelo's Almost-Dreams
"9" from Rabearivelo's From the Night
"51" from Rabearivelo's Old Songs From Imerina Lands
"Zebu"from Rabearivelo's Almost Dreams
Peace Corps Vignette on Mango Season in Madagascar
Business Case Study on Mango Production in Madagascar
African Poets of the Week Compilation

FUUO Poet of the Week from Namibia: Mvula ya Nangolo

FUUO Poet of the Week from Namibia: Mvula ya Nangolo


             Nangolo is widely acknowledged as the national poet of Namibia.  He studied in Europe for several years before returning to Africa in the mid 60's.  An active member of SWAPO (South West Africa Peoples Organization), a political liberation movement, the South African government sentenced him (after a year in solitary confinement without being charged) along with a large group of his compatriots.  He spent 16 years (of a 20 year sentence) in Robben Island beginning in 1968.

             After his release in 1984, he remained active in the Namibian independence movement and in the Namibian government after the country's independence in 1990.  He continues to write today.

            Nangolo's second poem, Guerilla Promise is GANGSTER!  These lyrics could very well have been spit by NWA or ICE-T back in the days.


Robben Island


Dedicated to comrade Andimba Toivo ya Toivo who spent eighteen years of a twenty year sentence on Robben island.  


Just how far is Robben Island from a black child at play?
What forces take his father there with all the world between?
Oh! Mother caution your warrior son again
or else he'll show his might

Just how far is Robben Island from the United Nations
   headquarters?
Have I time to ponder now when patriots are drilling fast?
Spears are flying and the shields are once more bloody
for the drums of war are beating again

Just how far is Robben Island from the London Stock Exchange?
You couldn't hear my talking war drums
for uselessly loud is the enemy's cannon roar

Just how far is Robben Island from the Yankee's White House?
I have no sight for I do not speak languages so foreign
the stars and zebra stripes are dazzling me
the US President speaks--his foreign secretary cheats

Then just how far is Robben Island from the field of Waterloo?
A few bushes away
a village or two in between
and the warrior son will take you there.




Guerilla Promise

I'll rush upon you
like escaping newborn sunray
that dazzle you with my lethal swiftness
'cause I'm the Fight
As unknown as an unborn battle
labouring with steel and hand grenade
I'm death conceived
'til my moment arrives
with pain...blood and terror
I'm a soldier of this realm
I'm a poisoned arrow
I'm a string-bow
I'm a sharpened spear
I'm a sword
waiting in my sheath
only for your death.

Robben Island

Toivo

Nangolo

LINKS:
http://www.brownturtlepress.com/authors/nangolo.html
http://www.klausdierks.com/Biographies/Biographies_T.htm
http://allafrica.com/stories/201205030140.html

Some of my favorite poetry books:

African Poets of the Week Compilation

African Poets of the Week Compilation

I've been negligent in my Poets of the Week the past few months so I thought I would do a little organizing and put together all of the poets that I've featured in the past.  I've included them below.

That Spring in 1994: Recollections on Rwandan Genocide
My recollections on Rwandan Genocide.

Poet of the Week: Muhammed Al-Faituri (Sudan)

Poet of the Week: Noémia de Sousa (Mozambique)

Poet of the Week: Mbella Sonne Dipoko (Cameroon)

Poet of the Week: Muhammed Bennis (Morocco)

Poet of the Week: Fatima Mahmoud (Libya)

Poet of the Week (and one of my all-time favorites) Ashur Etwebi (Libya)

Poet of the Week: Makuzayi Massaki (Angola)

Poet of the Week: Khalil Mutran (Syria/Egypt)

Poet of the Week: Jofre Rocha (Angola)

Poet of the Week: Jorge Rebelo (Mozambique)

Poet of the Week: Gwendoline Konie (Zambia)

A brave poet of the week: Abdirashid Omar (Somalia)

Poet of the Week: Frank Chipasula (Malawi)

Poet of the Week: Joseph Miezan Bognini (Cote d'Ivoire)

Poet of the Week: Baralong Seboni (Botswana)

Poet of the Week: Khaled Mattawa (Libya)

Poet of the Week: Everybody dreams of kissing you (Okai from Ghana)

Poet of the Week- Jean-Baptiste Tati Loutard (Congo)

Poet of the Week: Al Saddiq Al Raddi (Sudan)

Poet of the Week: Jean-Joseph Rabearivelo (Madagascar)

Poet of the Week: Manuel Monteiro (Angolan National Anthem)

Poet of the Week: Niyi Osundare (Nigeria)

Poet of the Week: Wole Soyinka (Nigeria)
In the Small Hours 

Poet of the Week: President Leopold Senghor (Senegal)

Poet of the Week: Hassan El Ouazzani (Morocco)

Lawful Magic

Poet of the Week: Rapper/Poet K'naan (Somalia)

Poet of the Week: Ali Houssaini (Moroccan National Anthem)

Poet of the Week: Moufdi Zakaria (Algeria National Anthem)

Poet of the Week: Leopold Senghor (Senegal)
Black Woman

Poet of the Week: Leopold Senghor (Senegal)

Noliwe 

Some of my favorite poetry books:

Poet of the Week Muhammed Al-Faituri from Sudan

Poet of the Week Muhammed Al-Faituri from Sudan.
    
Al-Faituri writes in a way that catches ones attention instantly and totally.  I only wish I knew arabic so that I could read it in its original form.  


To learn more about the Al-Faituri (also spelled Al-Fayturi), read this:
Dismantling the History of Slavery and Colonization in the Poetry of Mohamed Al-Fayturi and Langston Hughes 

A Scream

I understand Death's contract
and the finite ends of life:
however long a man lives
he lives only to die.
At the end, every scream
pours like a river into silence
but the most dazzling star
is that which shows the caravan its way
when moss has covered our memories
and grief runs wild though the house.


         
         Incidentally, you should read the following article on the difficulties of writing in another language.  I've including a snippet to whet your appetite--his insight is also useful for native English speakers as they seek to understand other languages:

Writing English as a Second Language by William Zinsser

I once asked a student from Cairo, “What kind of language is Arabic?” I was trying to put myself into her mental process of switching from Arabic to English. She said, “It’s all adjectives.”

Well, of course it’s not all adjectives, but I knew what she meant: it’s decorative, it’s ornate, it’s intentionally pleasing. Another Egyptian student, when I asked him about Arabic, said, “It’s all proverbs. We talk in proverbs.

LINKS:
http://fuuo.blogspot.com/2012/05/african-poets-of-week-compilation.html
http://afroasianwriters.webs.com/muhammadalfaituri.htm
http://www.jpanafrican.com/docs/vol1no9/DismantlingtheHistoryofSlaveryandColonization.pdf
http://theamericanscholar.org/writing-english-as-a-second-language/

Some of my favorite poetry books:

Poet of the Week from Mozambique: Noémia de Sousa

My apologies for the long drought without a FUUO poet of the week. 

Noémia de Sousa (aka Vera Micaia) was born in 1927 in Maputo, Mozambique.  She lived in Lisbon working as a translator from 1951 to 1964 and then she left for Paris where she worked for the local consulate of Morocco.  She went back to Lisbon in 1975 and became member of the ANOP.  In the early years of the liberation struggle she was very active.  She later left and lived in exile.  Noemia's background was Portuguese and Bantu and in much of her poetry she explores the idea of Africa and her heritage. 

Her poem below is phenomenal.  It’s angry and inspired and that final stanza—where she proffers her body as a medium for Africa’s struggle for freedom--wow, powerful.  And she ends her poem without a period, perhaps because her last word is ‘hope’ and what is more hopeful than an undefined end? 

If You Want to Know Me

By Noémia de Sousa

If you want to know who I am,

Examine with careful eyes

That piece of black wood

Which an unknown Maconde brother

With inspired hands

Carved and worked

In distant lands to the North.

Ah, she is who I am:

Empty eye sockets despairing of possessing life

A mouth slashed with wounds of anguish

Raised as though to implore and threaten

Body tattooed with visible and invisible scars

By the hard whips of slavery

Tortured and magnificent,

Proud and mystical,

Africa from head to toe,

-ah, she is who I am!

If you want to understand me

Come and bend over my African soul,

In the groans of the Negroes on the docks

In the frenzied dances of the Chopes

In the rebelliousness of the Shaganas

In the strange melancholy evaporating

From a native song, into the night …

And ask me nothing more

If you really wish to know me…

For I am no more than a shell of flesh

In which the revolt of Africa congealed

Its cry swollen with hope

LINKS:

http://fuuo.blogspot.com/2012/05/african-poets-of-week-compilation.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No%C3%A9mia_de_Sousa

http://www.antoniomiranda.com.br/poesia_africana/mocambique/nomia_de_sousa.html

http://poefrika.blogspot.com/2006/12/if-you-want-to-know-me.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Mozambique

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozambican_War_of_Independence

Some of my favorite poetry books: