Ogaga 
Ifowodo 
belongs to a 
younger, or as 
he prefers to 
call it — the 
stillborn 
generation of 
Nigeria poets: 
graduated in 
Law from the 
University of 
Benin in 1991 
and has since 
worked as a 
human rights 
consultant and 
editor of 
annual reports 
for the Civil 
Liberties 
Organisation 
(CLO) in 
Lagos. 
His 
unpublished 
first collection 
of poems RED 
RAIN won the 
Association of 
Nigerian 
Authors 
I GLENDORA ..y.™ | 
Madiba 
(Sonnets on and around the Long Walk to 
Freedom) 
I
Stepping away from the podium 
Where he swore allegiance to freedom 
He faced the multitude, an old man 
Made young to the span 
Of years it took the sun to rise 
And melt the mist, make wise 
The rainbow's all-inclusive colours. 
The millennial tears, the vapours 
Of death that stalked house and street 
Had fled the skin of easy meat. 
He looked again at the multitude 
Gathered today not for the plentitude 
Of anger to share, bury or explode 
But to witness a new world unfold. 
II 
And he threw out his arms, charmed 
The air as he sang the banned 
Kaffir song of terror, now anointed 
Anthem in open air, as he appointed 
The moment to memory's pain and 
pleasure: 
'Dance with me, Luthuli, dance the 
pure 
Motive of those early years. Dance 
With me, stars of Sharpeville, lance 
In hand against a false tongue. Come 
Biko 
Match my steps with a powered 
tango. 
Join the enchanted wind and sway - 
You who died dancing in Soweto - 
this day 
Is not blood and bullet but mothers' 
kisses 
On the waiting cheek, answers and 
teases?' 
And with the fallen branch 
Hope she finds her lost but happy 
ranch. 
Ill 
'And you, O you Chris Hani 
Gun on shoulder, dance with me. 
As one soldier to another, you know 
That graves are the last altar, no 
obstacle 
To the meeting of old boots 
When truce has sealed all truths 
Canvassed with the readiness of 
blood. 
The malevolent plot sought a flood 
Of fury to bind your labour, your MK 
And your people to the burning lake, 
a way 
Cold and desperate to stem the 
uncoloured tide 
Of this day. So dance, Hani, with what 
wide 
Smile that steeled the weakest heart 
And mined hatred's cushioned mat. 
IV 
In the secluded arms of Mvevo 
He followed the faintest echo 
Of a solitary bird from veld to kraal 
Absorbing the lay of the land, until the 
call 
Of milk matured on window sill 
Guided home his truant skill. 
Nature or nurture, a rebellious 
bearing 
Passed from father to son. Rearing 
Cattle at Umtata, or with bruised 
ankle, 
Learnt at play to serve honour in 
battle. 
African Quarterly 
on (he Arts 
Vol. 2/No. 2 GLENDORA,.
(ANA) poetry 
prize in 1993. 
Ifowodo has 
been in 
detention since 
early 
November 
1997 without 
charge at the 
instance of the 
Nigerian 
authorities. 
Madiba which 
is signed 'in 
Langenbroich, 
July 1996' 
belongs to an 
unfinished 
collection of 
poetry. 
GLENPORA ,.vi.w
He sat at the white palace in 
Mqhekezweni 
And burnished into shepherd, 
statesman and impi 
To face the dangers of a blunt world. 
Foreskin shed, he would man as time 
crawled. 
What may take the gentlest gradient 
Home to water. Leaves ardent 
On the lushest branch in the sun 
Wave to every wind. After the corn 
Ripest and sweetest with mischief is 
eaten 
(And odes to manhood's stolen pig 
written) 
An honest man must take his spear 
Draw his own blood to wear 
The coat of courage. Standing alone 
Where before the crowd emboldened 
the stone 
He took the first step at Fort Hare 
Bled his wound on the bare 
And bitter road of invisible gain 
To build a fortress for private pain. 
VI 
From snare to trap, danger marked 
his road. 
He would not wed with royal fiat. A 
toad 
Leaping from the burning bush 
Encountered the python's supreme 
push 
For food. The city of light 
Darkened near the distant view. 
Night 
And day passed on a patchwork suit. 
His sleeping-rooms mocked a suite. 
Midnight's melting candles pined 
For books in wax of love's rarest 
kind. 
His blistering feet found the road to 
Sisulu. 
He saw the naked sun burn them all - 
Zulu 
Xhosa, Coloured, Indian - and light 
The fires for the first communal fight. 
African Quarterly 
on the Arts 
Vol. 2/No. 2 
VII 
'Madam, are these ... yours? He 
spotted the slip, 
Brandished the white lady's briefs on 
pencil-tip, 
Turned her red-hot with racist shame. 
He forced the monster-hand of law, the 
claim 
Failed, freeing the unhappy maid. 
A thousand indignities daily prayed 
Redress. Ban orders in hand, they shut 
In his face the half-open back door to 
court. 
There were deputations and telegrams, 
protestation 
against a 'Whites Only' creed of 
humanity, notions 
Of privilege-in-skin-pigment ordained 
by God. 
They rolled the stone against every 
word 
Of reason. The centurions of race 
balloted 
If the kaffir and his Charter had rotted. 
VIII 
'Soup with meat', 'Soup without meat' 
Russian cookery book ... They had 
found it, 
Proof of the RED threat, gripped by the 
torment 
Of colours. A professor witnessed to 
the urgent 
Hour: 'Communism from the 
shoulder!'- 
His own words, which left to smoulder 
In a fevered brain, burned red with 
treason. 
Cookery not being colour-barred, 
forced reason 
Freed the quarry, the risen rage to 
hoard 
For the day when lunatic or liar's word 
Would point home the famished 
sword. 
Free and foul, how to sweeten the 
bitter cud? 
And they raided kitchens in search of
They would tell treason from 
plots 
meat in pots. 
IX 
Lilies' or poplars' leaves, none 
could proffer 
Eternal cover. At Rivonia the 
tougher 
Road ahead was mapped. The 
voice of peace 
Silenced with a naked fist found 
its lease. 
Gun would answer gun, sabotage 
would stalk 
The breeding-ponds of prejudice: 
'Walk 
The mile with me, if you wish. 
MK 
Shall throw burning spears in the 
fray. 
Puny these arms, but forged in the 
moral furnace 
They shall double the victories of 
your race 
Machine. This choice we wake, 
the knowledge 
Of the cherished blood to flow. 
Pushed to the edge 
We heed the head, our hearts 
renouncing the act', 
So the first commander, anointing 
the fact. 
He mended rags in prison with 
equal care 
As a mender of hearts: what the 
hands dare 
Touch is human labour. Old 
mailbags that shunned 
Their anxious letters, he and his 
comrades turned 
Waterbags for the news-thirst of 
the torturer. 
They broke rocks, mined lime to 
better 
The world denied them in and out 
of prison. 
Forbidden the open air, they 
called a meeting 
Wherever wind or smuggled note could fool 
The warder. Perched on a hurried stool 
The High Organ revived battle and the ANC 
Nourished on the rich diet of Mqhekwezeni 
He held court, turning the eyes of all 
To the common foe, to apartheid's fall. 
XI 
Even he would be startled by the harvest. 
Father in jail, children broke thirst. 
Drinking rage in every cup. He who taught 
Defiance was rattled by the lesson caught: 
They would stamp the earth, their earth 
With a loud voice and a firm foot. And let 
Regulations answer to order. 'Stand before 
An Officer?' 'What for?' 'Whose law?' 
He saluted the new epoch: 'Oh crocodiles 
Of the white river, who kept police files 
For men with lighted candles, look to them 
In the coming conflagration. Raise the 
anthem, 
The seed grew even in thorny ground. 
We will nourish the wild shoots found.' 
XII 
The years, the year ... Robben marked 
Them with hammer on stone. Nothing 
sparked 
Heat. The island segregated hate 
Made monks of married men. Delivered late 
The awaited letter came at last from the 
censor - 
A paper sieve, salutation the lone survivor. 
The nights, the nights, long on cold 
Floor. No embrace to unfold 
The heart wound full by walls and worry. 
He warmed his cell with her picture. Memory 
Stoked alive embers of the last kiss. 
He would rub nose with her, make this 
Daily mime light the fire of the first time. 
His prison-garden fruits found his rhyme. 
XIII 
Nights into days. The years had rounded toes 
And fingers in the first count. Even foes 
African Quarterly 
on the Arts 
Vol. 2/No. 2 GLEN DORA
Found the repeating time uneasy joy. 
Holy fury threatened another Troy. 
In township and mine, marching feet 
Saw a tank and dug a pit. 
The slow hand of time had suffered 
A stroke, moved with ill-tempered 
Pace to rust the lock. How many 
tides? 
Infested waters rose and fell. And 
tides 
Weathered weed, piled the bank with 
shoal. 
War at stalemate, so seemed the goal. 
Pressed by heavy walls into his secret 
self 
He climbed the cliff to place his dream 
on shelf. 
XIV 
There are no dead ends, only the 
birthplace 
of horizons. Plumbered with the bold 
mace 
New roads arise to the dance hall 
Rivers sweep to the flowers' whorl. 
It is the false prophet speaks oracles 
And hides from storms in tabernacles. 
He had dared storms, now he would 
be 
The storm. He set upon the lonely 
Task of prime maker of the road to 
freedom, 
Ploughing a plot for all in the new 
kingdom. 
Decades of talking to stone had 
spawned faith - 
Dry bones would live. Too long now 
the wait 
Wise maidens' lamps had exhausted 
the" oil. 
So he summoned his jailers for the last 
toil. 
XV 
Breaking through the dark forest, he 
saw only 
The high branch. Pledge to life wholly 
GLENDORA 
African Quarterly 
on the Arts 
Vol. 2/No. 2 
Lived, he would not gather dead 
wood. 
He purged his heart of its bitter food - 
He needed no victory, only the 
satisfaction 
Of hope: 'Now we may judge action 
Outside the blinding flash of war.- 
The child will sleep tonight. A mirror 
Will prove the mother's smile. Men 
Will spend evenings with their 
children. 
Laughter, at last, tickles the stern lips. 
Oh, grass is green again. The orchard 
steeps 
With fruit. In the cape, the water 
Sparkles with hope for fisher and 
swimmer. 
XVI 
So dance with me, Oliver, chance. 
You who plumbed wilderness, took 
the dance. 
And made fire without faggot. And 
You, Govan, who governed thought 
with hand 
And head, take my hand. Come to 
This dance, all of you, defiant to 
The death. Bring your tears and your 
cheer. 
shout 'Amandla!' and break the earth 
there 
Above your graves with your cry 
Of 'Ngawethu!' And firmly guide my 
Feet along the road you died walking. 
Stake on the tallest tree your all-seeing 
Eyes find. And chastise to the 
unerring path 
Your unbroken black pride in this 
day's aftermath.