(For Chief Barrister Feni Keni Koyunde
Sleep with anyone and get pregnant)

Oh Great Ones!
Call your children to the square!
Let the drums speak
Tum! Tum! Tum!
I have a story to sing!
A tale of a man with wings of wax,
who flies wherever the aroma of stew rises!

Wait—
Have you not seen him?
The man of many tongues!
Today, he is the crocodile of justice!
Tomorrow, a lizard licking the pus of thieves!

He claps for the Fool on the Broken Throne!
He dances for the One-Eyed Cook
stirring the nation’s pot of rot!

Ah, Belly!
You wicked landlord!
You have taken our son!
You have made him a flute
played by any who brings a bone!

He who once barked like a watchdog
now sings like a parrot on the lap of lepers!

When the Goblin of Owu,
that ogre with Odi-blood stained lips,
said:

“Give him food and he will shit on his mother’s head!”

Did we not laugh?
But the goblin spoke truth!

I remember:

“Who is bankrolling you?”
Ha Ha ha!
Four words—
heavy as Olumo
on the pot-bellied aviannequin!

He struts on the tarmac in torn pilot’s coat,
His belly bouncing like the buttocks
of a drunk dancer,
screaming:

“Captain! Captain of the Clouds!”

Yet, the Talkative cannot fly!
He cannot land!
He only flutters;
Whore of many airlines!

He boards no plane that serves no pepper soup!
He prays not to gods, but to pots!
He fears no demon, only hunger!
He dresses in borrowed feathers!

He calls his sidechick—my Lord and Personal Saviour,
But that is when the pot is full o,
and, of course,
he curses his father
when the stew runs dry!

The mini-star was not born in a hangar!
He was born in a kitchen!
His loyalty is in his stomach!
His passport is made of spoon!

One day
the plane will crash,
the stew will spill,
and your name,
oh Belly-Flyer,
will be smeared
in the black box of shame!

Tum! Tum! Tum!
Let the drums be silent!