Nemesis

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Nemesis

I have a secret

Sometimes I hear voices, 

Loud and timbrel-like wads of words. 

I hear them now as I punch these keys 

“You are not a writer. 

“Stop fooling around.”

I examine the keyboard. 

These are strange letters. 

And those words don’t cease in flow. 

I hear another voice

Staring into my heart, not knowing

It always seems distracted:  

“A sentence must be pristine -

“Simple and majestic! 

“Your syntax is hackneyed. 

“It is not top-notch

“Don’t write!”

The sun is now folding its mat 

Ready to relocate to another playground. 

The earth is walking away.

“Achebe must be angry

“Your ancestors are ashamed.

“ This is an Embarrassment!”

Embarrassment. 

That word is an explosive

My heart said so.

 It tells me things

Like how I should have married Sugarcane

Yes, that’s what it calls Ifunanya

The local drummer, whose sticks control traffic

Directing the blood to the groin zone 

Americans don’t behave like my heart

No one controls their traffic 

Everything waits for its turn

I took my heart to Mbaise today

 It wanted to learn how to beat drums


I hear the tonic solfa of a faraway ogene

It’s calling my waist out to play

I want to make love.

But I still hear the these voices

They are talking about a rejected kola nut

“Here is your umbilical cords. 

“We have nothing to do with you.

“Enough is enough.”

And they were gone.  



By

Newton Ray

Comments

  1. ElmappetisNovember 2, 2020 at 6:34 PM

    @they were gone got me.🤣🤣 I guess we all experience this, especially when we try to use our creativity. But the courageous always shuts them up.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Newton RayNovember 2, 2020 at 7:07 PM

      Hahaha... somehow I smile when i get there... And yes, when you persist on a course the voices that want to shout you down will gradually peter away...the only way to overcome not writing is to write, don’t mind the poor sentences.

      Delete

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