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She uses so few words

To say so much

Her verbal dexterity

Is as precise as a gymnast

Defying gravity
 with a flourish

Creatively observing each object

And every action and inaction

Rhyme, reason and contradiction

With the insight of the ages

Sculpting verbal works of art

That should be cast in bronze

Or chiseled from Carraran quarries

By some modern Michaelangelo

But instead

Even better

Her words are winged electric

Appearing wherever they need to

Now

And now

And now

To you

 

 

David Trudel  © 2013

 

 

I might say once you sprinkled constellations
in my eyes and scales went crazy
because my smallness could not hold
all of what was blooming
if this were a love poem
which it isn’t
so I won’t

I could mention your name was my mantra
for desire, whispered and rolled
under my tongue like a secret
a sweet one
if this were a love poem
which it isn’t
so I won’t

I could tell how the magic
of our meeting belled and rang
in a promise unrealized
and faded to silence
if this were a love poem
which it isn’t
so I won’t

this can’t be a poem
about a feeling that almost was
but never became
and so it’s not

This dance that we dance
It goes in varied circles around the truth
Our present world so small
Yet largely outsized by hate and gloom

For all our advancement in science
Communication and supposed intelligence

Basic humanity, kindness, and love still eludes the best of us

Kicking off with an introduction from Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka, the short documentary Fuelling Poverty amounts to a very brief Nigerian Fuel Subsidy 101 course. In thirty minutes, it covers the history of the issue and methodically explains how the government (encouraged by the IFIs, by the way) failed its people. By removing the subsidy as it did, the government shocked the informal economy and made life more miserable for a huge segment of the population. Subsequent investigations into the complex workings of the subsidy regime revealed a massive corruption cover-up to the tune of US $7 billion annually.

The poet Uche Nduka works hard at defying labels and definitions. His new work Ijele, published by Overpass Books, Brooklyn, N.Y. only deepens the enigma that is this seer. Who is Nduka? Well, if you group Nigeria’s post-colonial literature by generations, starting with Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka et al as the first generation, Niyi Osundare et al as the second, Nduka would belong in the third generation. From my perspective, this generation is probably the least studied, which is interesting because they have put together a robust body of work over the years.

Nduka’s generation of writers is mostly scattered all over the globe; the democratization of writing through the Internet has dispersed their works all over the place and it is hard to pin their works in defined volumes. Who are these writers and thinkers? In addition to Nduka, I am thinking of writers like Olu Oguibe, Afam Akeh…