Oluseyi Akinbami Poet Dramatic Monologue

Cries From the River Nun

A glib giant of the river borders 
The discerning ears of the ancient Power, we mourn
Where caravans cascade to unseen voices 
And the rumbling of avalanche bullets invades our peace 

This mind  captured it with a piercing eye
From river “Nun” 
ere wasting wore garbs of gloom  
this savage brandishing of  the source of livelihood 

Wiwa's blood spills, as the Khaki boys obeyed their paymaster  
Profligate bands in union vexed by demons hunt sane men "like partridges"  
With arms, murderous  Pirates just for greed offers bullets as our prize 
Subdued our river for gain never known. 
Ruined face-stretching pains like coverless carpet 
A reservoir of floods tumbles through the eye gates, 
Our rich resources ploughed by strangers, 
Where is Royal Dutch Shell? or Schlumberger, where is Chevron, Total 
when we are hungry,  
when we die, of pollution, 
where is Petrobras, Equinor or Agip 
when we mourn the damage on our offspring
we are silenced by the tyrants in Aso.  

Insipid insanity of blood brothers ignored safety 
Our tyrants cared for the gains 
and for gains, Wiwa was murdered,  
And a Massacre in Odi 
Kill them all, says the goggled tyrant,
Take the gains to Zurich, I will spend it tomorrow,
but like Mobutu, he never lived to count the cash 
For their greed, we die.
As these Lords watch the drama, smiling at our folly 
From the coast of ivory, where children groan in pain for jewels 
to war-ravaged Sudan, famished by the same burden 
and like Esau, we trade the future for ephemeral  
And obliterating while reenacting the trade of yore  
unending wars for greed, a blinding greed
Who will save these captives from the taskmasters?
Cocoa harvested in Ghana, Indonesia et al, yet not a chocolate plant 
but this coffee is not from Ghana,  
 the Chocolate bar is sent back at the dollar price 
Nigeria is rich with crude 
Yet they meander around a refinery from far off climes   
Congo is ravaged in war, who supplies the arm?
Oh! for a taste of Freedom

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