Gbobaloi Choreopoem

Ye who took our names

Ye who refused to stay

nor remain in the grave

but her womb torment and torment

Gbobalo ogbanje gbo kaaba don

Our anger will mark your faces

No more our cherished names

but naanyo ogbanje gbobalo

We’ll mourn you no more

You who refuse to stay long

on the land and in the grave

We’ll not spit

but our saliva, lick

Our wells have dried up

Our pots are broken

Our tears, they overflow

At your soul we’ll hoot and shoot

or gather no more, we, because of you

We dig no more into the earth, you to lay

Into the evil forest go we, you to leave
for termites you to chew

Gbo kaaba don

Abebrese Sumina

May the head of the ram

roll away your feet to leave

Into these dark shadows of no return

where you once lived

Oh cruel spirits of Ogbanje

of Ababio Pijir Jajir Gbobalo

gbo kaaba don

Leave

we in peace.

We’ll live!

Leave

with your kola.

In peace we’ll live!

Leave!

Drink the blood spill.

In peace we’ll live!

They have come like miners, all

all the water in us to drain

Stolen waters they still take

even through the same outlet

long after our pots are broken

overflowing their tear drops.

You die and refuse to sleep

You who were born

You who refuse to live

Da yie, sleep, yaawo jogban

Rest your energetic bodies

We have drawn our net

And our catch has been stale

Keepers of the underworld

Sleep not, rest not

Tie their restless souls

Hold with invisible chains

the unfailing strength

Ours is the well

already drying up

Its water has dried, deep

and our pots fit no more on our waiting heads

They overflow their broken parts

With tears they cannot contain

Spirits of Akokoshie we’ll not call

We refuse your sweet water

for our soul is bitter

Just a drop of your presence

Oh spirits of Ten tso

Receive our heartfelt gratitude

your solidarity for the past week

Before we laid to rest

Those tireless same faces

Same body 

Same day

Our pots got broken.

A shadow like a globe

Lay hold on the rays entering my eyes

Bigger and bigger when it passed me by

It gave a sound a clash of two rocks

Which grew this lightning splashes

Beckoning the departed to the market

when it is raining and shinning?

Ataa Naa Nyonmo blinked again

and we received our share

here in this wood

a waist in a bow, we labour in the fields

at the mercy of our feet lay

the greens on which the salty sweat falls

by the colour of our earth each step is painted

And visible on the feet

as each marching step prepares the land

the planting season has begun

when men in the fields their sharp cutlasses raise

women behind, the fallen leaves rake

as they sang

ke abele eba eee, ke abele eba eee…

gallant greens, plunge in pride and in their prime

grace the ground when golden rays fall

on them to adorn

the morrow and its sky

Should not let lose their tears down on them

Piloloo yaafo bemIi  

I could hear in my hut ( a kind  of children play)

Kwakwe bile egbo  (song accompanying a dead mouse)

Woya woya fu le,

ke emusu kamisa

As I pause and wonder

As I yearn to see this vision

this vision to which only my ears were privy

The noise passed behind my hut

The night passed into my hut

There his mother’s voice sounded, Kofi

Kofi, pick me some spice from the goat skin bag

The village queen who could not follow her love to the fields

Her baby in her womb, already stiff, hard and huge

like a mountain

O call me your dad,

Call me my man,

Call me him,

Call him before it drops here

Before I soil myself with it

A rush into and from the huts

Into the woods where legs cut through unused paths

And like a warrior chasing out his attackers

We made way through the thick dark night

The moon covered its face and looked not our direction

Her aches, the groaning came loudest

Life called on the right and death on the left

Where is the old man?

Did he stand on his wobbling feet for our sake?

Gone were the days in the midst of the compound

Gone were the men brave, with their swords raised

Waiting his tongue to sound, his tongue to lead the way

In a hand held up high

A calabash filled with water

Older women their white cloth covered

Around a calabash held high.

By a raised arm of a man

a man as old as the oldest of the land

He intoned these words, only few retained in my memory

Ataa Kpakpa kekewo

In solemnity he looked up

In awe his invocation to the unseen

,

,

His voice in submission let out:

Receive our water when they fall on the ground

And let our broom be thick together

A daughter you gave us is on her way to the waterside

She goes not with a basket to fetch water but a pot!

O let her pot be full when she returns!

O Her path, clear and smooth,

Dare not cross her path ye black cats

that precedes the blinking of the evil eye

The tongue that tastes pepper and salt

let it not find her, but return to its home to settle

We give you water

Let it be acceptable

Bless this earth which her feet lay

Bring her home with her pot filled with water

The water that will quench the thirst of our people

The fathers have slept yet walk among us

They forbid us going through their fofoi tsei

When the eyes of the moon open

and the croak of the cockerel has gone at once

woe unto you when you search abui in the dry grass

with a palm oil lamp when the moon fails to appear

No feet ever went through this darkness

without suffering a kiss from onufu  

Who will lead the way through the darkness?

May the fathers close their eyes on their tongue

and hear my plea amidst this raging waves

my strong arm is tied at my back

the other only cuts through the air missing its target

Dad do you hear and see something move in the grass?

Dad do you see the light in the grass?

Dad… do you see that tall thing ahead?

Huh? It’s nothing. I don’t see anything.

Young lips should only watch a stone when it has beard

A knock on the door

A palm oil lamp lights up

A door opens after a voice of an old lady is heard

A heavy load descends from father’s back

A rush to catch it when on the floor fell red 

A voice thinner than his, sounded after the lash

A question, if it was human

A smile on his face at last, after the answer

Still the sun sleeps in his hut;

the moon on a stroll 

when to yet another gathering he was invited:

the bright and morning star to accompany,

the new infant to see. 

With unique brightness it gazed

hearing from afar recitals and songs

to accept yet another infant

in joy as they gathered;

All in his presence, 

the infant to wish the best.

That morning with birds singing,

the rush through the thick thickets ...

A woman in labour a baby's cry...

So they gather together today,

early with the moon,

the infant to see,

water falling from the roof on her,

her cry on the ground: she is alive,

Water and corn drink to taste,

with gifts, in joy and hope

this infant to wish the very best.