Ghanaian Poet and playwright Oswald Okaitei has paid tribute to former President Jerry John Rawlings who passed away exactly a year ago.
Read his poem titled ‘The Artistic Tribute to Rawlings’ below:
And though
We were struck with sorrows amidst anger
At that nighty whirlwind
That stole its path into our land to keep you asleep,
365 days on,
We remain united, though in grief
To sing again,
Your never dying soul to sleep…
And let the dancers
Who danced before your cortege
To the banks of the last river
Re-enact your tale in Nii Yartey’s Musu choreograph
After, we shall ferry
You in the ship built upon the graveyard
Of Aunty Efua’s canoe;
Onward to the sacred land of the great long gones
Then, we shall return
Home to resurrect you; with Ablade Glover’s brushes
On the Michelangelo canvas
And paints expensive as the brand of Da Vinci
At a durbar ground,
Garry Smith’s drums we shall make to roar
Your name & sing your praise
In an orchestrated cacophonic symphony
And, comfort
Our bruised pains with Agya Koo’s
Yaa Amponsah’s strings
And with chorals from the solfas of Nketia
Then, we shall
With, Atukwei’s voice, speak of you on stage
And recreate you
With Awoonor’s words & lines & stanzas on pages…
We shall then breathe—
Breathe into you, a new fresh life;
Life given by man-gods,
Life without end till the end of times
And you shall live
In Ama Ata Aidoo’s paragraphs
And chapters in a prose—
A prose to be read by generations after generation and after generation
