Portion - universityofafricanart.org

During triennial yam festivals.
Before white men came
With sacred books and blood bondage
To drag our goats away in shame
In the same chains they bounded us.
Banned were we
Bent for saying our names,
For they said we had no names.
No age, no occupation,
No next of kin,
No fixed address,
No parents, no children,
No brothers, no sisters,
No cousins, no uncles,
No nephew, no nieces
No brain, no past,
No present cleared assured
Given no future
As I join my fellow felons
Of cold fate
In a date with hate
Where the rate is nothing
When we work
From season to season
Without any break in sight.
But before seven horses
Took seven circular villages
One following another,