YORÙBÁ DÌDE
Ọmọ Yorùbá ẹ dìde
Dìde, dìde, dìde.
Ẹyin Yorùbá ẹ dìde
Dìde, dìde, dìde.
Gbogbo Yorùbá ẹ dìde
Dìde, dìde, dìde.
Ọjọ́ ti pé, ẹ dìde
Dìde, dìde, dìde.
Ẹ má sùn mọ́, ẹ dìde
Dìde, dìde, dìde.
Iṣẹ́ ti yá, ẹ dìde
Dìde, dìde, dìde.
Èrù ò bà wá, ẹ dìde
Dìde, dìde, dìde.
Àyà ò fò wá, ẹ dìde
ENGLISHMAN IN BENIN CITY, 1981 (Part Thirty-One)
Gina did not look glad or relaxed. I could read it in her posture, without even getting close to her.
Rufus said, “Moyo, Gina is back!”
Steve hardly allowed the bus to stop properly before jumping down to run and hug her.
“Is that her?” Adolo asked Felicia rather softly.
“Yes,” Felicia responded. “That’s her.”
I got down slowly, and took my time locking up the door. Then I went to Gina. She looked down and didn’t meet my eyes. I thought, “She must be mad because she didn’t see us at her father’s funeral.”
YORUBA HISTORIOGRAPHY: FROM YORUBA RONU TO YORUBA DIDE
Hubert Ogunde did the opera “Yoruba Ronu” fifty years ago.
It means Yoruba, use your sense.
We are now beyond the stage of Yoruba Ronu.
We are now in the phase of Yoruba Dide.
Yoruba dide means Yoruba, stand up.
Let us begin with Yoruba historiography.
I prefer the name Yoruba Republic.
Oduduwa Republic would be a second choice.
I prefer Yoruba Republic because the word “Yoruba” already has a global circulation and reception.
Yoruba language is taught in many universities in the world, including the University of Texas, Austin, with two full-time professors giving lectures to undergraduate and graduate students.
In addition to the professors teaching Yoruba language, I teach Yoruba art, and there are distinguished professors teaching Yoruba history.
After I painted her,
she looks down at me
and asks me
what is the meaning
Who are the Yoruba people?
A mayor of the British army, Alfred Burdon Ellis, who served in West Africa for about two decades, published a book about the Yoruba people in 1894, the same year that he perished of malaria fever.
He wrote the following in the book:
“The territory now inhabited by the Yoruba tribes is bounded on the west by Dahomi, on the south-west by Porto Novo and Appa, on the south by the sea, on the east by Benin, and on the north by the Mohammedan tribes from the interior, who have within recent times conquered and
One day, I was having a discussion with a friend at the University of Ife in the early seventies.
I was seventeen years old.
Somehow the conversation drifted to “superiors.” I think he said something about “your superiors.”
I told him quite candidly that “I don’t have any superior.”
He was angry with me. Seriously, I don’t think he had heard that sort of response before.
But I was shocked that he was furious.
One Her Independence Day
I sent her
a flower vase
spun of orphic hair
with strands of gold,
each line gilded
with a ray of solar tint,
tightly woven into a dreamy jar
with slender pythonic fingers,
and detailed with combed titanic glints
boasting ornamental strings of rubies:
LIES, LIES, AND MORE LIES “Unity and Faith, Peace and Progress” is written at the bottom…
Another beautiful day to enjoy the sweetness of sunlight.
Gina sat on the floor by the doorstep waiting for us when we returned late to Benin City from Iludun. I didn’t she was sitting there until the headlamps lit up the spot where she was and Felicia said, “Hey, is that not Gina?”
It had been a long day spent mostly on the road and it took me a minute to adjust my mind to what was happening. I was exhausted from hours of driving on rough roads to and fro Iludun, Mama Rufus’s place.
“My he—he—he=aler at the psychi-psychi-atric hos—hos—hos–pital made me sw-sw-sw-ear never to have a con—con—con—con—con-fron-front-tation again with Miiiiiiiiisster Ru—ru-rufus,” Obaseki was whispering to me, from under the table. “Says he-he-he will bring me back back in.”
“It’s okay, Obaseki,” I said. “You come out and sit here at the table. I will go and see what’s happening.”
“Don’t, don’t, don’t leave me, Mo-Mo-Moyo,” Obaseki pleaded. “Please- plea-se-stay-stay-stay-don’t—don’t go….”
“It’s alright, Obaseki,” I assured him. “Whatever the matter is, we will get to the very bottom of it today. This is really ridiculous!”