The following beautiful and moving poem by Momodou S Sidibeh was published in the March/April 1984 edition of the journal, BALANG-BAA (The great resistance). BALANG-BAAl was an organ of the Movement for Justice in Africa - Gambia (MOJA-G).
TUMARANKE
(the Mandinka for Immigrant)
He wandered in trepidation...
Riding on high seas saddled
On the clutches of elapsed time
Feelings of dismay and despair
Accumulated from gory prison cells
Sprouding the whole body
Into a canvas of hairy images
The pangs of long-lasting frustration
The beach stretches long and wide
And elastic sands golden
Softly excuse the long strides
But the blistering sun and hurting rain
Antagonistic to the efforts
Break down the snail-pace speed...
Crawling to eternity
In the grips of a shuddering emotion
Retching and swimming in ecstasy
Sweet dreams of sugar-candy paradise
Images appear with soft contours
Images of shouting creatures, men and women
In a myriad of frenzied looks
Hurry...
Let's unravel this myth?
A million cocoons of sticky yarn
Pasted together by history's spinning wheel
This catalogue of treacherous events
Hardened by lying scribes...
And uncircumcised trading-post agents
Brother hurry...
Wide and illuminated streets and snow
and monstrous structures and plastic
And the looks
But who am I
My hair and my story
Different and true
As the sun sets
Cries of victory...their defeat
Call us home
To break asunder
Some pieces of Kola-nuts
Buried by grandmother
Cries and shouts
Ringing on the door...
Run, fall, crawl, walk...Run again...home