Somewhere in My Country, Poem by Uchendu kelechukwu Njionye

A wandering flutist

Stopped to eulogize an Iroko; 

This Iroko has no branch for birds to perch 

No leaves to shelter strangers 

Yet it stood

With the skulls of those who tried clenching to it but fell. 

Flutist began

with his legs wide apart like a drunk madman

His eyes dim- like a ghost making love to the wind, 

He touched the body of the iroko 

Trying hard to find words 

for you do not appease a nameless ghost.

Again:

Iroko has no bark to heal the grasses that shed him from erosion 

It’s source of water were the blood of those tiny vines that waited upon it to hang their dirty linings

And died of too much patience. 

Flutist began again :

This time calling on those who’d pass by 

To bring their idea on how best to roast a hairless Goat 

But all that answered were apparitions agitating for funeral rites 

With dirges on their footstep. 

If you help find a soothsayer 

Who can pick tears from seawater 

Tell him, somewhere in a forest

Lay a flutist with broken whistle and cracked lips

Seeking the best way to roast a hairless animal. 

Uchendu
kelechukwu Njionye is a budding spoken word poet and fashion designer,
with the stage name uchenjie, presently residing in Aba, Abia state
Nigeria. He believes Art is the best form of Expression.