present-day Bantu – my children.
Some were as black as a much-used pot;
Some were brown and even yellow-brown;
Some were tall as a stockade gatepost
And some were as short as our favourite thornbush.
There were types as thin as bullrush reeds
And others as fat as the proverbial thief’s bundle.
Some were idiots—
From dimwits they ranged
Down to utter nitwits;
Very few were truly wise!
In short, my children, they exactly resembled
The puzzling muddle of present day humanity!
Gone forever was the uniform appearance
Of the First People who could have achieved perfection
If they had been properly governed.
Not in appearance alone they differed,
But also in mind and heart and soul;
Where there had been perfect equality,
We now encounter diversity.
For thousands of years our Odu and Amarava
(Now called Mameravi or Mother of Nations)
Watched the bud of humanity slowly open
And burst into brilliant flower.
They worked, like the good parents they were,
Towards welding their countless descendants
Into one harmonious whole.
Advice they gave – they taught, and meted out justice
When disputes arose amongst their diverse progeny.
Finally Odu grew tired of life
And developed an inferiority complex;
Odu the Mighty – increasingly aware of his humble past
Now turned his mind to suicide.
He knew this demanded most careful planning
As an immortal cannot die,
Unless he destroys himself
Utterly beyond recovery.
So one night when all had gone to bed
He crept out into the sullen darkness
And embarked on a lengthy journey eastwards—
A journey that lasted a hundred days.
Finally he reached the active volcano—
Now the silent snow-capped Killima-Njaro—
And with anxious strides he scaled the grey slopes
Of the feature he had chosen for a grave.
The billowing smoke from multiple craters
Burnt his eyes and choked his lungs—
And dust-like molten ashes blistered his skin,
But he relentlessly pursued his aim.
When he reached the summit he paused
In the heavy clouds of choking smoke
And with a last prayer to Ma and the Tree of Life
He gracefully dived into one of the red-hot craters.
Odu, the soulless being, died
Without a world of his own;
He who had survived one world
To become the Father of the second.
In her lonely hut far away in the west
Amarava sensed her husband’s fiery death
And with a loud cry she snatched a copper dagger
And drove it savagely into her chest.
But the soft copper blade buckled
Against her breastbone and in her frustration
She tried to run herself through with a spear,
Though in this effort she was also defeated.
Zumangwe the Hunter
And Marimba the Singer,
Two of her youngest descendants,
Rushed in and overpowered her.
‘No!’ cried Marimba, with quivering ebony-black breasts,
‘No, you must not take your own life!
We shall not allow the star that lights our way
To fall thus from the skies—
If you are no longer burning,
Oh beautiful torch of our race—
Who shall guide our failing steps
Along all the thorny footpaths
Through the uncertain valley of Life?’
Thus spoke the dark and beautiful Marimba,
From whom our Tribal Singers claim descent;
So spoke the first Bantu poetess
Whose voice was the Voice of Spring
And whose singing it was said, could make
Even mountains cry cold tears.
Many, oh many are the tales about her
As many as the lice on an old skin blanket;
Many and countless as the hair on a dog’s back—
And one day – the gods willing – I might be able
To tell you the story of Marimba, my children.
Zumangwe and Marimba seized
