The Theme of Hopelessness in Kofi Awoonor's Poem - Songs of Sorrow
Image sourced from Pixabay
Born on March 13th 1935, Kofi Awoonor was a Ghanaian poet, author, and diplomat whose works largely combined the poetic traditions of his native Ewe people to mirror the decolonization of Africa and the overall western influences on the continent. Awoonor is credited with great collections of poetry such as, Rediscovery and Other Poems (1964), Night of My Blood (1971) and The House By the Sea (1978).
Awoonor was also a fine diplomat who represented Ghana in the United Nations between 1990 and 1994. He was unfortunately killed in the September 2013 Westgate Shopping Mall terrorist attack in Nairobi, Kenya.
Kofi Awoonor's Songs of Sorrow is a dirge in which the persona laments the calamity that has befallen himself and his entire household, blaming his dead ancestors for not doing enough from the land of the dead to protect their legacies.
Although the poem is divided into two parts, both parts are similar in that they express the lamentations and hopelessness of the persona whose calamity deepens as the poem progresses. In the very opening lines of the poem, the obviously frustrated narrator whimpers aloud, "Returning is not possible. And going forward is a great difficulty
He then goes on to figuratively express specific hopelessness,
If I turn here, the rain beats me
If I turn there the sun burns me
The narrator regrets that even members of his households who are travellers, and can possibly be the last hope of his households, are back but covered in debts. All hope appears to be lost. Here is how he puts it,
Alas! the travelers are back
All covered with debt.
It is interesting to note that while the lamentations go on, the death of Agosu, a prominent figure, who could probably rescue the falling household of Kpeti is announced. To this the persona sharply responds quite emotionally:
Alas! a snake has bitten me
My right arm is broken,
And the tree on which I lean is fallen.
In the concluding part of the poem, the now completely frustrated narrator sends the now dead Agosu to the ancestors who have gone before him. He tells Agosu, in consonance with traditional African beliefs, to ask the ancestors why they fall asleep and stay idle, falling short of their responsibilities of protecting the living.
Songs of Sorrow 1&2 by Kofi Awoonor
Dzogbese Lisa has treated me thus
It has led me among the sharps of the forest
Returning is not possible
And going forward is a great difficulty
The affairs of this world are like the chameleon faeces
Into which I have stepped
When I clean it cannot go.
I am on the world’s extreme corner,
I am not sitting in the row with the eminent
But those who are lucky
Sit in the middle and forget
I am on the world’s extreme corner
I can only go beyond and forget.
My people, I have been somewhere
If I turn here, the rain beats me
If I turn there the sun burns me
The firewood of this world
Is for only those who can take heart
That is why not all can gather it.
The world is not good for anybody
But you are so happy with your fate;
Alas! the travelers are back
All covered with debt.
Something has happened to me The things so great that I cannot weep
I have no sons to fire the gun when I die
And no daughter to wail when I close my mouth
I have wandered on the wilderness
The great wilderness men call life
The rain has beaten me,
And the sharp stumps cut as keen as knives
I shall go beyond and rest.
I have no kin and no brother,
Death has made war upon our house;
And Kpeti’s great household is no more,
Only the broken fence stands;
And those who dared not look in his face
Have come out as men.
How well their pride is with them.
Let those gone before take note
They have treated their offspring badly.
What is the wailing for?
Somebody is dead. Agosu himself
Alas! a snake has bitten me
My right arm is broken,
And the tree on which I lean is fallen.
Agosi if you go tell them,
Tell Nyidevu, Kpeti, and Kove
That they have done us evil;
Tell them their house is falling
And the trees in the fence
Have been eaten by termites
That the martels curse them.
Ask them why they idle there
While we suffer, and eat sand.
And the crow and the vulture
Hover always above our broken fences
And strangers walk over our portion.