 |
| A chip of the many broken boards |
 |
| Disciplined Focused Force for Ghana's Tomorrow !!!!! |
There was a certain psychic dissonance I contended with as the last week end approached. I was trying to understand why the bloodied, contorted and utterly dead body of the former president of Libya Col. Muamar Gaddafi(Rest in Peace; I do this in the millennia old tradition of Africa in which the dead is NEVER dishonoured) would be literally splashed over all the major global media outlets. In their inexplicably pathetic and infantile mimicry some of our local media houses followed their “leaders” reminiscent of the Pied Piper of Hamerlin. True to its latest form as a lover of cadaver pictures our Daily Graphic bannered Gaddafi’s corpse with blood congealed hair and contorted visage on its front page. TV3 during its prime time news on Sunday showed the man in his
dying throes and later on scores of weapon wielding youths animatedly posing and taking pictures with the corpse( so the murdered man who was vermin in life was worth taking a picture with in death; the irony of the logic; utterly perverse!!!). What was the point of this frenzied demon like feeding on blood and gore visually? Does anybody care about at the very least children and what such images can have on their minds and ultimately their humanity? Maybe in a weaponized world held hostage by unadulterated violence this moment must be seen as following the script: de-sensitize all of the world’s population to bloodshed so the military-industrial-academic complex will laugh all the way to the bank!!!!
But my mental pulverization was rescued by these children last Saturday. The arena was packed tight with energized children all decked out smartly in their Tae Kwan Do uniforms. At the behest of their hardworking instructors they set the stage in a sweet synchrony for the moment: board breaking. This probably eight year old lady took her turn. She was the first. A hush fell over us the audience made up principally of parents. Her first punch left the board intact. The second ditto. She span her punching hand in pain. I could feel her pain in my gut; wrenchingly. She did not stop. She struck a sturdy posture for the next go; her face intense pouring with concentration. Her instructor goaded her on. Then she let go: the board let out a croaky squeal of acquiescence and parted into two halves. We applauded. The lessons were clear: endurance, perseverance and will power in the face of overwhelming odds. This is what the world needs for the untamed greed that is impoverishing too many of the world’s population and disorientating the planet’s ecology and balance. That is the response the world needs to confront absolute power that can at a whim flatten cities, incinerate newborns and take over a sovereign republic in the pursuit of one man( the calculus is barbaric even if the man is Lucifer himself!) in Libya while too many applaud. And that is what we need sorely in our wretched Republic if we are to confront the moral degeneration, political profligacy, economic lethargy, religious fakery, social distress, infrastructural decay and all the other solvable ills staring at us in our ebony faces. You gave me hope little girl in showing such courage so many adults have abandoned.
I can only but re-echo finally and in sobriety the flaming, life –affirming words of one of my favourite contemporary poets Haki Madhubuti(1984):
the word is
the women & men
will love again
families will reappear
& children playing and growing
will be commonplace
& contiguous
ps: Papaye(on the Spintex Road) please get your toilet in shape(gents). Dishwashing fluid is for washing dishes not our African hands (and for decency sake and all the profits you make get a dispenser) and get some tissue for us as well. And also I do not get the hustle over tomato ketchup. I was considered strange when I made a demand for it and then the waiter returns in a bit asking to take it back; now that is CHEAP!!!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment