OUR HERITAGE
With a smoke pipe in my hands,
I lay on a seat of palm.
With thoughts of our land,
I frail.
The words of Nnamdi Azikiwe,
Navigate within the boundaries of my young mind.
“Originality is the essence of true scholarship. Creativity is the soul of the true scholar.”
A land once rich in culture.
The cradle of Life.
The land, where we are bridled.
A society of hospitality and serenity.
A land where great men once roam.
The home of illustrious sons and daughters,
Now a land of past glories.
The morals taught,
Now forgotten.
A continent of Light,
Darkness now lurk throughout the land.
The story of true legends.
From the Pharaohs of the North,
To the Chiefs of the South.
Over thousands of languages spoken.
Yet as sticks in a bundle,
Is our unity unbroken.
Our Heritage,
A subject,
Left unexploited.
We complicate our lives each and every day.
From immoral dressing,
To the disrespect of the aging.
Alienated to our own cultures.
We dance to the tunes of the west.
We say black is the absence of all colours,
And so we bleach.
Stop bleaching your skin,
And start reaching your goals.
The goals for which our forefathers fought.
They sought greatness.
Throughout the fight,
And with all their might.
The might to strive in this life.
Our skin tone is not the problem.
But our lack of Vision,
Has crippled our generation.
Our mission of greatness,
Now lay idle in the sands of time.
In the Sands of the Sahara,
Our vision lay undisturbed.
Our women,
Once full of passion,
Full of affection,
For Africa.
Now misled by the west.
From painting of face,
To the painting of nails.
Yet we call this misdirection,
Fashion.
The priceless sacrifice shall never be in vain.
Because in the sun and the rain,
The praise songs of the mighty Africa,
Resonates in our hearts.
Africa, Our Motherland.
From the longest river,
To the largest desert.
The mighty Kilimanjaro,
Touches the blue skies with its peak.
Yet we refuse to speak of this land.
The battles of the north.
The struggles of the South.
The toils and spoils of our land shall pass.
The genocides and apartheid,
Was nothing but ashes of the past.
Gone are the days,
When songs of the brave,
Were sung at night.
Are the gods to be blamed?
Or our flame of greed,
Made it so?
But the sun will shine once again,
As a beacon of Hope,
The light of Peace and Unity,
The sight of the pieces mended.
The sons of Africa ought to be recommended.
Indeed the songs of great sons die in echoes.
The continent of dreams,
Shall rise again.
In a new world,
I long to bury the thoughts of burning.
The burning of souls,
In the pit of slavery.
The Kenyan and Mauritanian,
Whimpers in the waters of the Mediterranean.
Tell me a story of Africa.
Africa,
The story of a giant in dreamless slumber,
Shall recover.
The New Africa.
A land of ingenuity,
Still lives on.