Oral Poetry from Africa
An improvised recitation sung by a Yorùbá bride as she is escorted by musicians and relatives to her husband’s house. She speaks her mind about all the hopes and concerns that she has, whilst drummers announce her arrival.
Those who stand-let them stand well.
Those who stop-let them stoop well…
A Yorùbá funeral poem from Nigeria. Within a few lines the poem evokes the weight of bereavement, and contrasts the reverence in which some deaths are held with the unsentimentality of others.
I cannot carry it
I cannot carry it…
An Ashanti drum poem from Ghana (see The Drum-History of Mampon for more about drum poems). The poem is praising the Earth which supports us in life and receives us in death.
Earth, condolences,
Earth, condolences…
The opening lines of a long Praise-Poem from Lesotho in praise of Moshoeshoe, the founder of the Sotho nation. Today the Kingdom of Lesotho is a landlocked country surrounded by South Africa.
You who are fond of praising the ancestors,
Your praises are poor when you leave out the warrior…
A song from the Gurage people of Ethiopia. Like Warga, Son of Qariso, this poem is in part an appeal to the successful man to share his wealth.
O cultivator, how great is your merit!
Wealth flows from your fingers…
Another in our series of Chopi Migodo, from Mozambique, collected by the great ethnomusicologist Hugh Tracey. In Gomukomu’s Ng’godo for 1942/43, work, taxation, and their effects on women are the dominant themes, against the background of oppressive Portuguese rule.
