Come Thunder
Now that the triumphant march has entered the last street corners,
Remember, O dancers, the thunder among the clouds…
Now that the laughter, broken in two, hangs tremulous between the teeth,
Remember, O Dancers, the lightning beyond the earth…
The smell of blood already floats in the lavender-mist of the afternoon.
The death sentence lies in ambush along the corridors of power;
And a great fearful thing already tugs at the cables of the open air,
A nebula immense and immeasurable, a night of deep waters —
An iron dream unnamed and unprintable, a path of stone.
The drowsy heads of the pods in barren farmlands witness it,
The homesteads abandoned in this century’s brush fire witness it:
The myriad eyes of deserted corn cobs in burning barns witness it:
Magic birds with the miracle of lightning flash on their feathers…
The arrows of God tremble at the gates of light,
The drums of curfew pander to a dance of death;
And the secret thing in its heaving
Threatens with iron mask
The last lighted torch of the century…
By Christopher Okigbo
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