"Africa" by David Diop
Africa tell me Africa
Is this you this back that is bent
This back that breaks under the weight of humiliation
This back trembling with red scars
And saying yes to the whip under the midday sun
But a grave voice answers me
Impetuous son, that tree young and strong
That tree there
In splendid loneliness amidst white and faded flowers
That is Africa your Africa
That grows again patiently obstinately
And its fruit gradually acquire
The bitter taste of liberty
This poem strikes me as being incredibly powerful. Africa has struggled for centuries under the oppressive rule of foreign white men who coveted their resources and took all they could while keeping the people suppressed and wounded. After suffering from this humiliation, abuse, and oppression, one by one all of its individual nation-states broke free from the stranglehold over it. Yet, with freedom also came the arbitrary dividion of land and the nonsensical drawing of borders which separated ethnicities and families.
While Africa is reborn after its dark history, it still suffers from violent clashes, hasty grabs for land and precious resources, massive corruption, unruly leaders, and an intense potential for self-destruction. Who suffers the most? The civilians, the farmers, the children, the laypersons on whose backs the continent was built. Freedom and liberty don't always bring about hope and change. Often it just replaces one evil doer with another who becomes so drunk with power he cannot possibly see the continual path of violence and destruction he brings forth on his people.
This just makes me wonder if Mauritania will ever change? Will it take 10, 20, or even 50 years? I imagine that the failed hopes, the lack of forward thinking, the chronic disrepair, desperation, and deterioration will continue as a means of temporary survival. Living for the moment is all we can expect.
Janine
