You Laughed and Laughed and Laughed by Gabriel Okara

 

 

You Laughed and Laughed and Laughed

Gabriel Okara

In your ears my song

is motor car misfiring

stopping with a choking cough;

and you laughed and laughed and laughed.

In your eyes my ante-

natal walk was inhuman, passing

your ‘omnivorous understanding’

and you laughed and laughed and laughed

You laughed at my song,

you laughed at my walk.

Then I danced my magic dance

to the rhythm of talking drums pleading, but you shut your eyes

and laughed and laughed and laughed

And then I opened my mystic

inside wide like the sky,

instead you entered your

car and laughed and laughed and laughed

You laughed at my dance,

you laughed at my inside.

You laughed and laughed and laughed.

But your laughter was ice-block

laughter and it froze your inside froze

your voice froze your ears

froze your eyes and froze your tongue.

And now it’s my turn to laugh;

but my laughter is not

ice-block laughter. For I

know not cars, know not ice-blocks.

My laughter is the fire

of the eye of the sky, the fire

of the earth, the fire of the air,

the fie of the seas and the

rivers fishes animals trees

and it thawed your inside,

thawed your voice, thawed your

ears, thawed your eyes and

thawed your tongue.

So a meek wonder held

your shadow and you whispered;

‘Why so?’

And I answered:

‘Because my fathers and I

are owned by the living

warmth of the earth

through our naked feet.’