Out of Africa: A Creative Philosophical Journey in Search of a New African Avatar
Retrospection:
“… Of the Ethiopians there are diverse forms and kinds of men. Some there are toward the east that have neither nose nor nostrils, but the face all full. Others that have no upper lip, they are without tongues, and they speak by signs, and they have but a little hole to take their breath at, by the which they drink with an oaten straw … In a part of Afrikke be people called Pteomphane, for their King they have a dog, at whose fancy they are governed … And the people called Anthropomphagi which we call cannibals, live with human flesh. The Cinamolgi, their heads are almost like to heads of dogs… Blemmy is a people so called, they have no heads, but hide their mouth and their eyes in their breasts”
– Pliny the Elder (AD 23-AD 79)
Out of Africa: A Counternarrative Poem by Timothy Sage
Two thousand years back
In the land of the sages
Musings on Africa by the wise men of the ages
Out of Africa, always something new
One would think that Aristotle and Pliny really had a clue
But they thought that Africa was the homeland of savages
Darkness so deep, you could illuminate with the dark ages
Beasts of no culture
Breeds unknown to nature
Bare-chested hippos
On flat-breasted she-goats
Trees for shelter
Leaves for textile
The fighting bush tribes
The dying little child
Twins for sacrifice
Bloody paradise
Bloodthirsty monsters with gory appetites
I cringe to think that this they inked of Mother Africa
Twenty-four thousand full moons
The storyboard is still gloom
Twenty-four-inch TV screens
Images of killing sprees
Bloodbath in Benghazi
Gun battles in Bakassi
Hostages in Nairobi
Refugees from Burundi
Death from HIV-AIDS
Debt and foreign aid
Liberia down with Ebola
Terror drowning Yola
Dictators intimidate us
Rulers are looters
Poverty in Soweto
Anarchy in Mogadishu
Slums in Lagos
Crumbs from child labor
Sex for hire
From Nigeria to Italia
Someone please tell me this is no reality
A generation out there is crying for identity
I’m tired of this avatar
Show me the real Africa
She’s the motherland who dares to look the sun in the face
They call her the dark continent, but she lights up the world with her gaze
She is creative, imaginative, innovative, and inventive
Her history is a story of great kingdoms
And her stories, full of wits and great wisdom
She shaped civilisation long before the industrialisation of nations
They call it fables, but it’s visualisation and imagination
She built the world’s first spaceship with folk tales that gave wings to the tortoise
She landed a woman on the moon long before the 35th POTUS
She navigated seven continents across seven rivers and seven jungles
And discovered electricity with tales of lightning flashes and thunder rumbles
Her greatness is not in the obelisk of Aksum
Or the pyramids of Egypt
Or the bronze heads of Ife
Or the heights of Kilimanjaro
Or the centres of learning from Fez to Timbuktu
Her greatness is in her people
soaring high like eagles
Blazing through history like stars in the heavens
Sons and daughters at home and abroad
Heroes of Africa, her gift to the world
She roused her children to greatness with the words of Kwame Nkrumah
And stood up to oppression with the fight of Patrice Lumumba
She stormed the world with the songs of Miriam Makeba
And took a long walk to freedom in the jail cell of Madiba
She moved the world to tears with the voice of Selif Keita
And reshaped the Queen’s vocab with the pen of Wole Soyinka
She led the nations with the brains of Kofi Annan
And scored great goals with the boots of Zinedine Zidane
She fed the poor with the feasts of the world’s richest
She threw straight punches with the fists of the world’s greatest
She cat-walked the runways in the feet of the world’s prettiest
She raced through the tracks in the feet of the world’s fastest
Oh no, she’s not done yet, cause she’s pregnant
Africa is pregnant
She’s pregnant with ideas and amazing startups
Styles and designs, fascinating fashion
Beats and rhymes, topping Billboard charts
Scenes and lines, Oscars a la carte
Groundbreaking inventions of high-tech geeks
Breathtaking adventures of her whiz kids.
Goodbye to the negative stereotypes
Goodbye to the narratives of genocide.
Africa, arise and shine
Africa, this is your time
When they tag you by the militants in Benghazi
Remind them of the gifted hands of Ben Carson
When they tell you of the atrocities in Bama
Tell them of the audacity of Barack Obama
When they label you by the slowness of your growth
Tell them of the swiftness of Usain Bolt
The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light
On those who lived in the shadow of death, light has dawned
Can anything good come out of Africa?
Timothy Sage came out of Africa
I am Timothy Sage. I tell WoW stories.
Timothy Sage is the story-telling and creative brand persona of Omoaholo Omoakhalen, Founder of Remake Africa
Leave a Comment