Lemin Sissay to recite poem for AU anniversary

Poetry will have a place at the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Organization of African Unity, the precursor to today’s African Union. Award-winning Ethiopian-British performance poet and playwright Lemn Sissay is in town and he will be performing at different venues in Addis Ababa for the for the celebration of the Golden Jubilee.
The first event will take place on Wednesday, 22 May at the National Theater, where the poet will be performing selections from his internationally acclaimed works. Beweketu Seyoum and Ephrem Seyoum will be supporting him for the event.

A poem by Debebe Seifu

Debebe Seifu (1950-2000), the late Ethiopian poet and academician, wrote poems exploring topics ranging from struggles of the working class to the great imponderable such as beauty and truth. A warrior for truth, Debebe’s poems ring with a remarkable sincerity. His major themes were the creative impulse, power dynamics, greater self-awareness, and the clash between the artist and the values of a philistine society. Debebe, who studied English literature at the Addis Ababa University at Master’s level, taught at the same university — all the while balancing his academic life with his writing. He wrote most of his poems in Amharic and he translated a couple of them into English, though they remained unpublished. Here is one of his poems entitled, “We are now writing dirges”.
The fire blazing
Its tongue flowering
Called on us
To wrap ourselves
With its flaming scarves
But you and me
Warmth-proof that we were
Began to write dirges
With left-over cinders
On a tablet
Of tear-gray ashes

‘Tekemechie’ by Yohannes Admasu

It’s Friday, as good a day as any for an incisive Amharic poem by Yohannes Admasu (1927-1975) about a man interrupted during the act of contemplation. He is sitting in a contemplative mood in a solitary room, listening to sad and melancholic music. A cigarette between his fingers, the smoke has become his companion, so he says. The music and the smoke set him in a mood to release his inner feelings, the echoes of the heart. The following lines convey cloudiness with references to blood and poison. While in the middle of that inner search, there came an unwelcome knock at the door. The beauty of the smoke and the rhythm of the music are brought to a standstill. I liked the poem because of the way it evokes the man’s inner search and celebrates contemplation, silence, solitude.

Tessema Eshete’s Medina

A restored classic recording of the acclaimed Ethiopian musician and vocalist Azmari Tessema Eshete was reissued last month by the French label Buda Musiques.
The luxuriously restored and compiled CD was part of the 27th edition of éthiopiques, historic recordings made by Azmari Tessema in Berlin 100 years ago. This was the first ever Ethiopian music to be recorded.
This recently reissued CD was a collaborative effort of Tadele Tessema, Tessema’s grandson and French music producer Francis Falceto. This project has also gained the support of UNESCO as well as the Institute of Ethiopian Studies and the Alliance Ethio-Française.
Negadras Tessema’s songs are accompanied by the mesenqo, a one-stringed lute. The very first Ethiopian lyrics ever to have been recorded, they are mainly in Amharic, with two songs in Geez, and one in Amharic with some lines in Arabic.

“Enkuan” a poem by Teddy Afro

Ethiopian music star Tewdros Kasahaun (fondly called Teddy Afro) has recently read number of poems that he has written while he was in Kaliti Prison. The poems were mostly personal observations, reflections and meditations and have some prominent people as their subjects.The following Amharic poem that came out in today’s edition of Kumneger magazine criticizes some people who were trying to make a scandal out of the renowned writer Sebhat Gebregziabher’s marriage to a girl much younger than him.”Enkuan” which literally means “So what?” is a word that Sebhat often makes use of when people confronts him with accusatory remarks.
The selection of the poems will appear in a book coming out soon.

For I was there!

(Addressed to Christian missionaries of the world)

 

by Dr. Hailu Araaya

 

When the last trumpet shall have sounded

And all men shall have risen from the dead,

To the left of the Throne shall assemble a multitude-

Men and women with faces behind masks.

(Masks of arrogant blindness they had worn on earth

And now risen with them to betray them on judgment day).

To this multitude Christ shall say:

I was there,

In everything and everywhere,

But you saw me not.

Lament of A Prodigal Son

It was a surprise and delight to find an English poem written by Dr. Yonas Admassu in “Emergences’, a journal that I came across by chance in a small bookshop. The inside note says that it is the journal of the Group for the Study of Composite Cultures, published by the University of California.

Dr. Yonas is an assistant professor of Amharic literature in the department of Ethiopian Languages and Literatures at Addis Ababa University. In addition to his teaching post, Dr. Yonas produces various criticism and translation works famous for the lucidity and brilliance in both style and content. Yet he has also some poems to his credit.

I’ve already posted a poem that he has translated from Amharic before and once again I am taking the liberty of posting his whole poem here.

The poem, one could safely say, establishes a clear, precise prose standard and is accessible and plainspoken. He describes of his walk to the cemetery where he says has discovered a “solitary figure upon which sat the noble ideas of an old friend” and to his grandmother’s tukul where he says saw a snail “patiently leaving a trail of life” and a moth “dancing about to an inaudible rhythm”.                                                                 

                                                   Lament of A Prodigal Son

                                                      (or, Homewardbound)

                                       1

In my mind’s mind,

hovering some thirty thousand feet

above neatly arranged patches of brown and green,

I tried to recreate the bits and pieces

of an unfulfilled vow,

and landed with a limping imagination.

Homewardbound.

                                 

Poet in the making

Yonatan Telelew is only sixteen, yet he has published an Amharic poetry book. His poems deserve attention not because they were composed by a 16-year-old boy but because they have freshness and astonishing directness. They reflect an appreciation for the birds, trees, flowers and show concern for social issues.

 Yonatan likes to observe his surroundings and his attention is directed outward to what is going on around him. The detachment of a young boy adds objectivity to the perception of experience portrayed in his poems.

Apologies to Ms. Ullman

I’m a Hama Tuma fan.He writes the most marvellous poem, with a warm feel to it.There is always some surprise or other just lurking around the corner.The next poem, ‘Apologies to Ms. Ullman‘ reprinted from his poetry collection ‘Of Spades and Ethiopians'(1991) has a taunting use of apparent praise and aplogies for dispraise.I have no idea if Liv ullman, the character in the poem, is a real or fictitious one but it seems a familiar story told in an appealing way.

Melkam Ken Tolo Na

Here is an Amharic poem composed in anticipation of the New Year that I have received from Mitiku Adisu through my e-mail. I’d like to express my appreciation for the contribution.