NIGHT RAIN
What time of
night it is
I do not
know
Except that
like some fish
Doped out of
the deep
I have
bobbed up bellywise
From stream
of deep
And no cocks
crow.
It is
drumming hard here
And I
suppose everywhere
Droning with
insistent ardour upon
Our roof
thatch and shed
And thro’
sheaves slit open
To
lightning and rafters
I cannot
quite make overhead
Great water
drops are dribbling
Falling like
oranges or mango
Fruit
showered forth in the wind
Or perhaps I
should say so
Much like
beads I could in prayer tell
Them on
strings as they break
In the
wooden bowls and earthenware
Mother is
busy now deploying
About our
roomlet and floor.
Although it
is so dark
I know her
practised step as
She moves
her bins, bags and vats
Out of the
run of water
That like
ants filling out of the wood
Will scatter
and again possession
Of the
floor. Do not tremble then
But turn, brother,
turn upon your side
Of the
loosening mats
To where the
others lie.
We have
drunk tonight of a spell
Deeper than
the owl’s or bat’s
That wet of
wing may not fly
Bedraggled
up on the iroko, they stand
Emptied of
hearts, and
Therefore
will not stir, no, not
Even at dawn
for then
They must
scurry in to hide.
So let us
roll to the beat
Of drumming
all over the hand
And under
its ample soothing hand
J.P.
CLARK
.
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