Song of a Lover Boy

Song of a Lover boy  

I never really knew

That love intoxicates like fermented wine

Until I sipped little from it in trial of ignorance

And found myself speechless

Wondering and wandering,

In recalcitrant lust

I became new copycat of Adam

In the second garden of Eden

Pushed by the desire of my own flesh

I never thought love as a game of emotion,

A wild humming fly of passion

Wandering around for place to domicile

Until I opened the door like Samaritan

But to be stung by homeless moth of tenderness

I felt the sweetness of it

And I became a serf of Cupid

Note From Ebedi Poet: For Tosin Gbogi

As the sun continues to perform the magic of rebirth

Reincarnating its glory from the womb of west

So the clamor continues to beget many fruit of agony

For the fate of a puzzled nation

Eclipsed underneath the feet of moribund mute

As day and night continue to stage the drama of wonder

Exchanging baton of their planery miracle in row

So the nation continues to dwindle in tumult and panic

Like the mead hall of Hrothgar empire

The panic of who will bear the witness of next daybreak

Before the red-eyed dagger of onslaught,

The tumult of pauperdom and want

Spread across the nation like gospel of foreign crusader

Through the trickeries of butchers, Alapata Apata

Living at the extreme end of slaughterhouse,

A mammoth skyscraper of blood called ass-hole-rock. 

II

Gbogi, since your departure to the land of Queen

The message of your sermon still permeates

Into the rigid ribcage of the nation

It rings bell like warning of Noah

White-bearded old man who summoned his people

Against their sins in the court of contrition

The message of your cry remains (more) limpid

But for the story of your land to remain the same

Tyranny has clad in regalia of arrogance

Riding on the spinal cord of the nation like horse

III

Gbogi, good time stands aloof in pity looking crestfallen

It fails to come like second coming of Jesus

All what left to write about in the kwashiorkored diary

Of our puzzled state is busy history held in confusion

By the xenoglossy of political liars

We are left at the cross road like clueless voyagers

 Like strangers in the land of our birth

And we start asking the question "what are we here for?"

Internet Voting As a Decisive Factor for Critiquing Literary Works: A Glaring Symptom of Intellectual Maggotism of Self-Acclaimed Connoisseurs and Conspicuous Syndicate Of Literary Robbotism

I would rather be attacked than unnoticed. For the worst thing you can ever do to a writer is to be silent as to his works.

                                                                                               Samuel Johnson

Life of a writer amidst critics is like a candle in the wind which destiny of its survival is very tentative. That is just it, or that is the way it is when you are a writer trying to create space for yourself in literary realm. As a writer I’ve been at the confluence of praise ad curse; endorsement and rejection; optimism and pessimism, and I sometimes thought I would leave writing for those that will write when the rood became unbearable to haul. Criticism appeared to me for the first time like stalwart ‘brothers of the highway’ beseeching ‘nothing’ you said is in your pocket before their rifles hijack soul from your body in exchange. Heaven cast mercy on me- a South-African critic blushed out on my poem on All-poetry online forum, which prior to that time received myriad encomiums from apostles of pen, and some messengers of eulogy on social platform of facebook. I won’t be the one to have found myself in this as nearly all great writers encountered such draconian criticism.  John Keat was advised to go back to his cotton, plasters, injection . . . when he showed his first collection of poetry to literary critics. They told him writing is for those learned not for people propelled by intellectual pregnancy. The first question I asked myself after my maiden encounter with this unknown critic is ‘what literary criticism is all about, is it a curse or praise, burden or mercy, must or non-compulsory before the works of any writer could be kudosed and rated best? I was left at the crossroad battling in sphere of thought.

 Ever since the time immemorial literary criticism has been in existence and has ever been as aged as literature itself. It involves critical evaluation, in-depth analysis coupled with unparalleled survey of any literary genre by critics well-versed in literary judgement. Creative writing and criticism or whatsoever appellation we may call them, from pedigree are inseparable duo. This typifies that a writer has nailed himself at the front incisors of literary jaguars irrespective of whom he may so far he assumes to be writer. However, what spreads tentacles inside my heart is the question of who these critics are- I mean literary critics of contemporary Age, our Age? Perhaps some bookworms of ancient libraries or bookholic wizards who the Canterbury tale of Chaucer as long as it is, all sonnets of Shakespeare and their entangled deployment of language, countless poetry of William Wordsworth and critical essay on criticism of Swift dwell in their bellies? Or if possible those self-acclaimed literary gurus online who pour on you panegyrics for long love poem written for your imaginary maiden, Aduke, Asake. . . ?   

Contemporarily, there have been different faces of literary contests but on what medium or grounds are the works of these literary muscle men judged and evaluated?  Nobody who is literary conscious of the reality of contemporary criticism will dispute the fact that criticism is firstly being webbed with political mess and moral bankruptcy. You see people getting over-zealous and fierce thereby creating synergy and hypocritical syndicate with those in-charge who may also manipulate things to favour the contestants who have kowtowed and grovelled for them all for tarnished fame and already belittled prize that their works do not worth. Secondly, some organizers of these contests find satisfaction in embarking on internet voting; participants are enjoyed to use the avenue of downy page of internet for noise-makers who are not literarily oriented but ordinary messengers of praises  to pass judgement and cast vote. The third plague is that when this award is being won through all forms of manipulation, the winner takes away his or her prize, goes back to his or her home and leaves writing in oblivion.  My questions are: are there no people who can critique works and award prizes to those whose works worth it? Are there no people like Alexander Pope, Jonathan Swift, John Dryden, T. S Eliot and others? Is this how the fate of literary criticism will be left at the jawbone of self-acclaimed literary connoisseurs and those who see facebook and twitter voting as platform through which literary works can be evaluated? If the answers to all these above questions are all the same as we perceive it then the future of writing is at risk.

This reminds me of some contests I will always relegate to the background if the improbable criteria and feeble procedures for their criticism and judgment are not amended. If I forget all the memory of Etisalat Flash Fiction Prize still breathes in the pouch of my remembrance. I can confidently say it without sentiment or personal temperament that the prize has manifested itself as undisputable epiphany of intellectual maggotism of the highest order which displays itself not only as instrument of demoting the literary prowess in young African writers but also as a resilient stance of literary saintly sinners who do not only deluge us with their intellectual viruses but make meaninglessness out of their narrow outlook of literary writing. Irrefutably, those endorsed through their works cannot publicly boast that there works are the best.  Another clear instance is that of YimuCentral poetry prize won by one of my friends who even claims till now that money is not yet fully paid. Ten shortlistees were selected and were made to beg people on the street and intellectual larvas and pupa to be voting without knowing the rudiments for such works to be appraised. 

I will never forget Nego poetry contests for patent and apparent display of favouritism and unambiguous ethnical sympathy coupled with glaring self-confessed literary junks as their judges who couldn’t solve simple arithmetic of poetry but enjoy their shortlisted candidates to go through rigorous video poetry performance, upload it on Youtube, share the links on online pages and implore their facebook friends and foes, kin and kiths, family and online buddies who are mere mirages and illusory entities  in literary realm to cast vote and pile up eulogies on poetry with staggering diction and poor use of words. This is how it goes and the dreams of finest writers are risked by those who think are watering and nurturing literature to blossom.

Conclusively, I will say this new face of literary evaluation is very irksome. Imagine you enter for a contest and the organizers tell you to post your works somewhere on facebook and the more comments you have (from noise makers, messengers of eulogy, intellectual robots, and rotten vegetables) will determine your possibility of winning the prize. It will be very dispirited and disheartened if this feeble avenue is the platform through which any artistic work is subjected evaluation all in the name of literary criticism.