Oral Poetry from Africa
The following epic poem of Amoogu was composed by Kaalu Igirigiri, an Ohafia Igbo poet, and transcribed by Professor Chukwuma Azuonye from recordings made in the field between 1971 and 1977.
Odududu ndufu!
Wardrum, without whose leadership there is fear on the way!..
Odo, as practised by several Igbo-speaking communities in eastern Nigeria’s Enugu State, is the occasion when ancestral spirits return in the form of masked dances to share in important events, or simply to bridge the gap between the living and the dead. The dancers perform in public arenas and openly compete, both in their costume and in poetry.
May the gathering here listen,
listen:
for it’s the Odo that hears the market din…
An Igbo lament from eastern Nigeria, listing six very pragmatic reasons for mourning a dead husband.
Six times the widow recalls her husband’s death.
When the yam-planting season sets in early…
An Igbo fireside song from eastern Nigeria. The first half of the poem describes an act of kindness to a small bird. The second half describes a reverence for life which is its own reward. We are not sure what the chorus “Ngalama” refers to, if any Igbo readers could enlighten us please get in touch.
I was working quietly in my own farm
Ngalama…
This song was recorded by Romanus N. Egudu (n.d.) in the Udi Division of Igboland, Nigeria. The song is a pleasant game with words, but it can be taken in different ways. The boy has lost his pet rat. Everyone knows where the rat is. Is the problem that they daren’t approach the leopard’s house? Or is it implied that the leopard has eaten them all?
The boy was looking for his rat.
Nda
His rat was hiding in leopards’s house…
An Igbo prayer from eastern Nigeria. The names invoked, Agu, Okaibe, Ogbaugu and Ezenna, are the elder’s ancestors, to whom the kola nuts and the prayer are being offered.
Agu, my father, come:
Take kola and chew…
