Long Benue Poems

let's dive into the thought of that Benue woman.
let's see through her sorrow carved separately,
how many children are born to die before noon?
1966 saw this on the tail of her skins proudly, 
till 1977, pogom...

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Anyammiri Ala Any? 

(Tears of Our Land)


 Izunna  Okafor dere ab? a


Ala Na?jiria ebegbuo onwe ya n'akwa
Anya mmiri anya mmiri ebe niile
Akwa ?t?t?, akwa ndeeri na akwa ar?r?
?nye ga-az? ala any? ? 

Chi ?b?b?...

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We opened a book that started with the name 
of our country.
The right side was numbered corruptions  and the other side was numbered greed & bad leaders.
We burnt the stride of our bodies into...

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There was a aseason

When love was love
the educated are uneducated
hunger was hung in daylight
when sins were seen in scenes

There was a season

when poverty was prohibited
obscenity totally abhored
the gods are justice par 
excellence
when people peopled with...

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And this song fell out from my father's lips:
Of boys learning to drop the corpse of their
parents' bodies on the high mountain of Jos, 
Of  girls who came home learning to place fingers 
on...

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The sun shall rise again but
not in our season of songs this time, 
because we are strange to it glamouring light. 
We sparkle and shine not among its  Galaxy of hope, 
an unformidable corrupt...

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Folks, I perused it in black and white;
The Octogenarian verbalized after the civil war that
"There are no victors and no vanquished."
Scores of years gone by, we now visualize
Who the victors and the vanquished are.
The victors...

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Let's create two cities: death and tears,
We'll name our tears shitholes because we've forgotten why we were called so by he whom power rests on his shoulders.
These memories of ours we titled death are fragments...

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Mother won't bleed--
Mother won't bleed again to the breaking song
according to the gospel of insanity of man:
She says life is in the hands of a madman,
she says Sunday is not enough to bless the 
memories...

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when they reached Cameroun, from the heart of Africa's West
they had no priests; they had no religion; they knew IMMENSITY
they had, too, the fairest of metaphors (no macho patriarchy):
recalling the POTTER who breathed into the...

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I know of a great man from Benue;
A wonderful string beholder of now,
Whose smile calm the storm of life.
His laughter echoes and sound in joy.
Once on the keys of a weak keyboard,
It comes back to...

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This is Africa a friend to the west and home 
At west with Eastern coal
River Benue bend us to farm
River Nile march her name like
Nobles night of bliss in Cairo
She is the anchor of sun...

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THE  FAIRYTALE  ESTATE.
These  wooden  slate  of  grace
Written  inside  the  Egyptian
Cave,
The  symbols  of  every
Name,
Is  a  stranger  to  decide
His  faith.
The...

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You said you have, and I have not anything –
You are monied, and I am down and helpless
So let me alone to my fate to go
Away from you to my lonely abode
To on my lonely...

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The bricks for earth’s foundation
Weren’t made in masonry of any Nation
Benue Cement was not used
Neither was Ajaokuta iron
Part of the hard concrete

He cast the pillars of eternity
Before time zone saw limelight
Then laid the foundation of...

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To Christopher Okigbo
To Chinua Achebe
To Wole  Soyinka
To JP Clarks
To Habila Helon
A measure of time past
I am part of your dark side


To this wayward side of this wet Benue roads, children had learnt to be...

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I wake up every
morning
to ask myself
'what's happening'?
God gave us oil in
the Delta,
waters in the Benue
and Niger,
mineral resources
all over.
Though we've no
natural disaster,
but we got loopholes
that need plaster.
And now we are
falling assunder,
that is making me
wonder,
am even behaving
strange...

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The song about you is love.
I have knitted your laughter
In the coven of my heart to rest,
fondled your smiles to rest in peace,
Remembering your defeat to hatred.
We'll sing of you in unison uptown
the mountain of...

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I know a river;
long before I began to 
hold a pen
those days of-
-"twinkle, twinkle little 
star"
I know a river;
A river of words; 
not river-benue or 
river-niger
But its a  river that 
flows in human-
imagination
And a...

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No! Nigeria! Why!

We have always been happy despite the hitches.
We have wept together despite our half-baked unity.
We have laughed together despite our different trinities.

No! Nigeria! Why!

But came OCTOBER the overwhelming independence.
We are free! We are...

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My people I have seen seas of pains
With series of painted assaults and
Hatred from elites of illiteracy
My people no not again my people
For it is the same people that gives
Us this sad injection of deprivation
If...

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Author: Okechukwu Iroegbu
Title: Let them hear...

Let them hear...
From the hills of Isuikwuato
My sleepy hilly land'e
From my new'est bride Uyo
To the ancient muds of Enugu
From Makurdi's Benue river beach
To those peaked crags of Jos
Let them hear...
As...

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Our Benue our future
Our pride our Nation
Our dreams our hope
Our home our hut. 

Our Benue our future
Our food basket of the nation
Our Benue from which we live
Our source from which our blood comes. 

Our Benue...

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My dear fervent land of emulous miserere,
Had I be your creator or swish despot care,
Whose cloat can awe beyond exalted gild,
Then you'll bloom than grass, and wet sild,

River Benue, and Niger can faint thy yearning,
Of...

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