Results and Analysis

Nigeria has produced few female poets, although some female writers have been publishing poems in various journals and anthologies. In contrast, female novelists have been geometrically increasing. The female poets thus deserve attention because they not only constitute some of the “unheard voices,” but they also possess significant insights into the realities of con- temporary times. Lloyd Brown (1981) feels: “the women writers of Africa are the other voices, the unheard voices, rarely discussed and seldom accorded space in the repetitive anthologies and the predictably male-oriented studies in the field”

3.3.1 Catherine Acholonu

Catherine Acholonu poems in The Spring’s Last Drops draw their subject matter from the realities of life and contemporary events. The poems are also modulated by the sensitivity of female mind that reacts to personal experience and incidents through a consideration of their wider implications. The poems are interestingly divided into three sections bearing the titles “Cultural Loss,” “Anger of the Gods,” and “A Celebration of Silence.” In the section “Cultural Loss,” Acholonu explores tradition through the use of numerous personae. However, the persona that dominates most of her poems is seen as a creator - one who has been sent to the world to mend some of the divine and mundane deficiencies in human nature. In the title poem, “The Spring’s Last Drop,” the poet presents the labour and suffering undertaken by the persona in order to acquire the truth:

I have laboured up the hill through toil and sweat and I cannot spill it this water so pure so clear so sweet

the dying spring’s last drop (16).

The poems in “Anger of the Gods” are used also to explore tradition. But in these poems, Acholonu indicates that tradition should not be discarded recklessly. In the poem, “A Child’s Plea,” for instance, she writes:

but mama a tiny hole

by a tiny palm tree was all I needed Why did you deny me tomorrow? (43)

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She used a persona whose after-birth is not buried where it can be recognized but rather is discarded in a pit latrine to illustrate the manner in which worthwhile customs are crazily abandoned. In effect, she explores oral tradition as a viable model for the examination of current social, political, and economic issues disconcerting Nigeria.

The poems in the section “A Celebration of Silence” are mostly symbolic. The longest poem, “The Message,” which is about seven pages is placed in this section. The persona in the poem is seen as a seed that will germinate into a useful human being.

This poem codifies (apparently) the poetic view of Acholonu. The last stanza of the poem is significant for it says:

You have many more miles to walk

may your midday offering ripen into evening

and your

evening offering

last till a very long time (57).

The implication is that the persona, perhaps like the writer, has just commenced the onerous task of acting as conscience, which is one of the unenviable tasks of a poet.

The poems in The Spring’s Last Drop are lyrical. The author has made obvious efforts to make them chantable especially with the adept use of repetitions and refrains.

A poem like “A Child’s Plea” is particularly lyrical, and in these poems, full of emotion, Acholonu excels.

One significant feature of the poetry of Acholonu is that she is neither a rabid feminist nor an unadulterated traditionalist. There is an element of neutrality in her poetry which generates the impression that she wants to be seen first and foremost as a poet before she is considered a woman. In the final analysis, something about the poetry of Acholonu, both technically and thematically, creates a lasting impression in the minds of the reader. The poems are relevant, alluring, and fairly competently executed.

They are neither obscure nor excessively simple, and the poet manages to strike a balance between form and matter.

3.3.2 Flora Nwapa

The subject matter that informs Flora Nwapa;s long poem “The Cassava Song and Rice Song” could be autobiographical in the sense that it is taken from the author’s experience. In “The Cassava Song,” Nwapa pays tribute to the cassava plant which has a tradition as one of Nigeria’s staple food. In this song, Nwapa enumerates the various uses to which cassava is put. It could be made into foo-foo; it could be transformed into the delicacy garri; and it could be made into cassava pottage. Moreover, she praises the cassava plant for sustaining people during the Nigerian civil war when almost all other crops failed. She compares it with cocoa and palm trees and wonders why it has been neglected despite its invaluable service.

By contrast, in “The Rice Song” Nwapa condemns the society’s penchant for rice. She acknowledges that rice was not supreme in people’s diet but that dishonest businessmen surreptitiously introduced it until “our people gradually / Began to have a

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taste for rice.” And like all acquired appetites, rice has managed to lessen the desire for locally grown food items. Nwapa therefore insists that rice must be banned and that local growers of other food items should be encouraged.

“The Cassava Song and the Rice Song” are patriotic poems by a sensitive writer who uses the poetic medium to comment on sundry events. The two songs could be perceived as symbolic, for while the cassava song symbolizes tradition, the rice song symbolizes western influence. In the process, Nwapa indicates the subtle manner through which corrupt and destructive influences could be introduced into the society.

In terms of subject matter, Nwapa has performed a relevant task, but her poetic talents leave room for improvement. She does not care for such vehicles of poetic technique as rich imagery. She makes straightforward statements that are prosaic except that they are placed in stanzas.

3.3.3 Molara Ogundipe-Leslie

Molara Ogundipe-Leslie, in her collection entitled Sew the Old Days and Other Poems tackles all those feminist issues that Acholonu and Nwapa gloss over. She therefore produces poems that retain their relevance from people to people and from country to country. “Sew the Old Days” is divided into two sections: the first part entitled: “heralding desire” and the second part called “From Our Toes, Roses Grow.”

Quotations from the poetry of the Angolan president, Agostinho Neto, herald these opening sections. It is clear from the dedications that Ogundipe-Leslie admires several African poets including Okigbo, Neto, p’Bitek, Okara, Awoonor, Angira, Senghor, and Diop as well as black Ameri- can writers like Paule Marshall, Toni Morrison, and Alice Walker. More- over, the impression is that Ogundipe-Leslie has synthesized her admiration into a literary focus for a better understanding of the foibles of man and woman.

The poems are varied, depicting not only originality eloquence and innovativeness. However, most of the Ogundipe-Leslie’s commitment to the realities made it clear in various essays published in diverse hood in Africa is a neglected state.

She blames women for men to exploit them, in the poem “Man to Woman Ogundipe in Laughter).” The image of a fly says to the eye:

you too, you too my foolish you!

to lay self-open for me to rake! (23)

This image is used to illustrate the consequence of that exploitation and the eventual blame heaped on the unsuspecting woman. Although the poet insists that this poem is constructed in laughter, it nevertheless portrays her perception of the perennial war of the sexes. Her concern for honesty is also illustrated in her treatment of the relationship between men and women. In the poem, “Yoruba Love,” she indicates that when people smile and whisper words of endearment one should “run for shelter, friend/run for shelter” (24).

Although feminism is at the root of several poems in Sew the Old Days and Other Poems, Ogundipe-Leslie extends its tentacles to explore the variegated aspects of

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human existence. In the poem, “Letter to a Loved Comrade: A Prose Poem,” she asks fundamental questions about the role of women in the struggle for a just social order.

The contradictions, the paradoxes, and the conflicting desires of revolutionary struggles are tabulated as the poet points out: “These are the pains we face in Africa today; the truths we seek in/all the struggling world, from place to place” (27). This poem apparently codifies Ogundipe-Leslie’s convictions that the nature of women is often misunderstood, and their peculiar problems are insensitively neglected in the bid to make them react like men in crisis moments. The poet, therefore, illustrates that quite often a dividing line cannot be conveniently drawn between altruistic motives and inevitable actions.

The poems also touch the ever present reality of Africans in the diaspora. The poet obviously feels that, despite the distances separating peoples of African descent, they are united by their common historical tribulations. In the poems, “For a Friend, a Poet of Negritude,” she illustrates the relevance of having a heritage which is capable of eliciting viable progressive ideas for contemporary times. The hope which emerges in the poems is illustrated in the poems, “Africa of the Seventies (to a Comrade)” and

“A Harsh Beauty Must Be Today”; and it comes out clearly in a line from the poem

“Tendril Love of Africa,” where the poet hopes “that life does not slaughter our dreams.”

However, the paradox of the diaspora is not glossed over in the poems. In the poem, “Song to Black America of the Sixties,” Ogundipe-Leslie reveals that part of Africa’s problems is lack of self-knowledge. She uses images of Black Americans who scream: “Yeh man, to survive, man, you need survival skills,/not history, shit and culture’n stuff/you can get hung up on history, man,/and forget how to survaaaaaive”

(ii) to epitomize the enormity of ignorance.

The virtue of Ogundipe-Leslie’s poetry is that it does not cease at mere pontification on the travails of women. She rather uses the reality of present times to symbolize fundamental events. In the poem, “When Fater Experience Hits With His Hammer (Song for the Middle Class African Women),” she uses instances, of what she regards as the unwillingness of men to alleviate the suffering of women, to comment on the nature of Africa. She questions:

But when was the master ever seduced from power?

When was a system ever broken by acceptance?

When will the Boss

hand you power with love?

At Jo’Burg, at Cancum or the UN? (33)

The message to be derived from this symbol of power is that power is never given but taken by all lovers of freedom. Ogundipe-Leslie has successfully slaughtered two birds with one literary stone, for while she succeeds in condemning the bondage of men, she has also successfully extended the metaphor to explore the substantial continental issues of bondage that are important to the dispossessed peoples of the world.

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In terms of style, the poet incorporates the Japanese haiku technique. In these succinct poems like “Firi: Eye Flash Poems” and “Haiku to Ripening Guava,” the poet effectively illustrates the art of using few words to make timeless statements. Perhaps some of the other shorter poems in the collection are influenced by the haiku style for their brevity does not diminish the appropriateness of the themes. The poem, “Mating Cry” is particularly significant for it says:

Love, roll a ball of sunlight in your hands throw it to the minds, and

let its incandescence melt us (48).

This poem captures the overpowering effects of love and likens it to the sun which melts, in a captivating illustration of the mingling of bodies and minds which love generates. Furthermore, this love theme is explored in a highly relevant poem, “The Errors of Our Rendering,” which explores the relationship between men and women by using the refrain: “and there are here/the errors of the rendering” - a reference from Christopher Okigbo’s poem. She uses the idea of love in this poem to comment on the trepidations of Africa as she asks:

And so many errors that our history is unrendered and cannot be rendered

by minds mininourished and political children (5 6).

The poet conceives self-deception in Africa as one of its most prominent causes of disasters. This poem is then not only an individualistic exploration but also a communal reassessment of the realities of Africa.

Ogundipe-Leslie is not only concerned by the relevant themes but also by technical competence. The poems have a taut style that portrays a fair control of images towards a poetic vision of a viable social order. However, the tender poems indicate that she is championing the battle for the assertion of women’s rights. This tendency to weave in so many strands in her poetry generates a diffuseness that often jars the clarity of her vision. It is erroneous for Ogundipe-Leslie to perceive whatever man (male human beings) represents as fashioned to subjugate women. In the final analysis, the impression she succeeds in creating in the reader is that the elimination of man would create a utopian society, which she apparently wants; but this is contrary to any commonsensical evaluation of reality.

Nevertheless, Ogundipe-Leslie has shown in Sew the Old Days and Other Poems that poetry is capable of revealing diversities in both themes and technique. The poems portray the emergence of a female poetic voice that is insisting on a re-evaluation of poetic connotations, through the depiction of vivid imagery, tight control of syntax, fresh vision and relevant thematic concerns to reflect the realities of womanhood.

Acholonu, Nwapa, and Ogundipe-Leslie offer us highly illuminating poetic stances.

The ideological convictions of their poetry make the issue of womanhood in contemporary Nigeria very controversial. While Acholonu and Nwapa seem interested in making a case for their appreciation as women, Ogundipe-Leslie insists that she must be heard as a rival who is anxious to “de-ego” men who are stuffed full of numerous macho ideas. The contrasts in these poetry collections are between radicalism and conservatism, modernism and traditionalism, and communalism and individualism.

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Acholonu and Nwapa would appear to want to reach a compromise, but Ogundipe-Leslie would want a confrontation.

Artistically, Nigeria’s female poets still need to be adventurous. How- ever, the female poets should be commended for as Katherine Frank observes, “there are surely vast silences to be broken, silences of African women who have ceased to write or who have never written at all because they have felt there was no audience to hear their words (1984, 47). Nevertheless, the fact that these faltering early steps are being taken indicates that this is the planting season of female poets in Nigerian poetry. In the harvest, we fervently hope to pluck the robust yam tubers and the fledgling seed- lings.

The study of contemporary Nigerian poetry may never be complete without the assimilation of these feminine poetic impulses.

SELF-ASSESSMENT EXERCISE

Discuss the thematic concern of Nigerian female poets, citing as many examples as possible from different poets.