🛑 Warning – long
This poem was about Things Fall Apart by Achebe. It was written as extra credit on our literature final exam. Out of 10 points possible, I got 10 points and a Very Impressive!
*Sadly, I remember reading Things Fall Apart but don’t remember writing this.
When White Man Came
In the beginning, this assignment I did dread.
In my mind, this story need not be read.
Chinualumogu Achebe, who was he?
Just another author to be shunned by me.
A story about African culture,
made my brain want to rupture.
A story full of words I could not pronounce.
Upon this story, I did not want to pounce.
Ikemefuna, Ezeani, and Nwakibie to name a few;
at first what they were, I did not have a clue.
Things Fall Apart, it could have meant anything.
The bells in my mind refused to cling.
The main character Okonkwo was overbearing.
The thoughts in his mind he was not sharing.
His father Unoka was gental and kind.
About work and money, he did not mind.
Because Okonkwo had to overcome young, he began to hate all his father had done.
Ikemefuna was injected into his life,
which gave him much strife.
The son he had always wanted;
so young to the ancestors he was anointed.
Killed by a collective blow,
into his new fathers arms he could not go.
His daughter would have made a better son, than the one his life had brung.
Okonkwo’s biggest fear
was his father’s life his would mirror.
To show emotion, laziness, and joy,
were shunned as part of his ploy.
Well respected by all,
Okonkwo stood tall.
For an accidental crime,
he was sent to his mothers land for time.
Seven years of lessons he could have learned,
but into his mind they were not burned.
His personal problems were over shadowed, when into the village a white man clattered.
To bring Christianity to the lost souls,
on the clan this took its toll.
Then the white mans government came
to destroy the native cultures rein.
Barbaric, wild, untamed people they were.
Natives that the white man must purge.
Evil was to be driven away;
from every village even today.
To spread Gods love was the plan;
but the government wanted the land.
Split the clan, divided the countries, and the white man scoffed;
when warring clans killed each other off.
Killing the culture inch by inch,
Putting the natives in a pinch.
When the seven years in his mothers land came to an end,
Okonkwo, homeward his mind did bend.
He gave a feast to his mother’s kin.
They were pleased to see a young one follow the roots like the old one had done.
His village was stronger than his mothers; he knew the white men were killed by his brothers.
His old village was worse than expected,
for a white mans community had collected.
All Okonkwo wanted to do
was rebuild his home and fortune anew.
At the end, death did come
by his own hand the bell was rung,
to the ancestors he did go,
far from the white man his soul was sowed.
Achebe’s novel about Africa’s rife,
could be an account of all natives strife.
The invasion of the west
into every native culture was to crest.
Their idea, laws, tongue and religion
was carried through the world by a pigeon.
The missionaries were a front
and the government was very blunt;
in telling the natives their culture was nothing.
A better way of life they were bringing.
Achebe’s novel filled me with rage
with the turning of each page.
It took me to a different time and place. His novel can be related
to the Native Americans culture that was annihilated.
People and culture were killed
at the white mans will.
Blood and smoke poured into the earth and sky
while they watched people die.
There are many lessons to learn and many images have been burned into my lives mind eye forever.
For a better future “we” must endeavor,
to be better than the past
these lessons must last.
No culture is inferior!
Western culture is not the superior,
of religion, life and the world.
Other peoples have became a blur,
to an overbearing population
that wants more than to rule a nation.
The end
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